Duncan Wu
Piecing it All Together
Making the Monster: The Science Behind Mary Shelley's Frankenstein
By Kathryn Harkup
Bloomsbury 304pp £16.99 order from our bookshop
In Search of Mary Shelley: The Girl Who Wrote Frankenstein
By Fiona Sampson
Profile Books 304pp £18.99 order from our bookshop
‘It was on a dreary night of November that I beheld the accomplishment of my toils’: the line runs too deep in the marrow to be dismissed as mere cliché, as if it echoes some long-forgotten incantation. Yet it was composed a mere two centuries ago, occurring at the beginning of an everyday tale of DIY resurrection and psychic disintegration, written by an eighteen-year-old girl who had eloped to the Continent with her lover, a flaxen-haired, anaemic, shrill-voiced hooligan called Bysshe.
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One study found that hoarders 'had lesions on the mesial prefrontal cortex of their brains ... Collecting and hoarding, in other words, are the results of brain damage.'
James Delbourgo explores the psychology of minimalists & collectors.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/gardens-of-emptiness
New double issue of @Lit_Review just out. Lots of incisive reviews ( including by @BurlM11 ) of a wide range of new history, politics, fiction and general books plus a nice little piece on Philip Larkin. Thoroughly recommended!
Only the Summer double issue (July/August) of @Lit_Review Lots of great summer reading.