Thomas Hodgkinson
Say It In Greek
I'm A Man: Sex, Gods and Rock 'n' Roll
By Ruth Padel
Faber & Faber 382pp £9.99
Rock music is like religion: it’s something you grow out of. And then later, wiser maybe, you grow back into it. Guys take it very seriously, like religion (think ‘Clapton is God’, scrawled on the walls of the London Underground). Ruth Padel grew into it late and takes it seriously. As a young woman she played chamber music with her family, studied Classics, wrote poetry – and so her stance in this study of white rock and its relation to black music and Western masculinity is that of the cultured outsider.
‘I’m a Man’, Padel confides in her title, but she isn’t and that’s a bit of a problem. Many of her ideas about maleness are built on the ideas of other women about maleness (Greer, de Beauvoir, Froma Zeitlin). She says:
Men hide behind shiny desks, shiny cars, Armani suits, swaggery rhetoric,
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