Carole Angier
Pomp Prodigy
Mad Madge: Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle, Royalist, Writer and Romantic
By Katie Whitaker
Chatto & Windus 436pp £20
IT IS TO the credit of this serious and scholarly book that it fails to live down to its title. 'Mad Madge' was coined by nineteenth-century critics, Katie Whitaker tells us, and was unjust. It is a shame, then, that she uses it herself, and I can only think her publishers persuaded her.
Then, in her prologue, she tells us something else she will not live down to (or perhaps 'up to' this time). She sets out four questions about Margaret, Duchess of Newcastle. How had she come to break with social convention and write all her books? What sort of person had
Sign Up to our newsletter
Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.@Lit_Review
Follow Literary Review on Twitter
Twitter Feed
Knowledge of Sufism increased markedly with the publication in 1964 of The Sufis, by Idries Shah. Nowadays his writings, much like his father’s, are dismissed for their Orientalism and inaccuracy.
@fitzmorrissey investigates who the Shahs really were.
Fitzroy Morrissey - Sufism Goes West
Fitzroy Morrissey: Sufism Goes West - Empire’s Son, Empire’s Orphan: The Fantastical Lives of Ikbal and Idries Shah by Nile Green
literaryreview.co.uk
Rats have plagued cities for centuries. But in Baltimore, researchers alighted on one surprising solution to the problem of rat infestation: more rats.
@WillWiles looks at what lessons can be learned from rat ecosystems – for both rats and humans.
Will Wiles - Puss Gets the Boot
Will Wiles: Puss Gets the Boot - Rat City: Overcrowding and Urban Derangement in the Rodent Universes of John B ...
literaryreview.co.uk
Twisters features destructive tempests and blockbuster action sequences.
@JonathanRomney asks what the real danger is in Lee Isaac Chung's disaster movie.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/eyes-of-the-storm