Kathryn Hughes
She is Editor of the Esteemed ‘Art Press’
The Sexual Life of Catherine M
By Catherine Millet
Serpent’s Tail 182pp £12
Catherine Millet is the girl who can't say 'non'. Editor of the highly-regarded Art Press, she has made it her life's work to sleep with as many men as possible (she has always, she says, had a thing about numbers). Millet's previous book was a scholarly study of contemporary art. This one is an equally rigorous account of how, and to some extent why, she has fucked just about every man she has ever met. The book has been a huge success in France, where the revelation that one of the country's pet intellectuals likes to drive around the Bois de Boulogne looking for sex has caused a huge frisson of delighted disgust, not to mention increased sales. It would be rather like Lisa Jardine revealing in immaculate prose that her favourite evening activity was cruising Tilbury docks eyeing up the talent.
The way Millet describes her life – a pretty standard routine of fearsome hard work, smartish parties and the occasional weekend in the country – makes you wonder what you have been missing out on in your own. Millet has only, for instance, to go down into a Metro station for an employee to shove her into a cupboard
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
London's East End was long synonymous with poverty and sweatshops, while its West End was associated with glamour and high society. But when it came to the fashion industry, were the differences really so profound?
Sharman Kadish - Winkle-pickers & Bum Freezers
Sharman Kadish: Winkle-pickers & Bum Freezers - Fashion City: How Jewish Londoners Shaped Global Style; Fashion City: ...
literaryreview.co.uk
In 1982, Donald Rumsfeld presented Saddam Hussein with a pair of golden spurs. Two decades later he was dropping bunker-busting bombs on his palaces.
Where did the US-Iraqi relationship go wrong?
Rory Mccarthy - The Case of the Vanishing Missiles
Rory Mccarthy: The Case of the Vanishing Missiles - The Achilles Trap: Saddam Hussein, the United States and the ...
literaryreview.co.uk
Barbara Comyns was a dog breeder, a house painter, a piano restorer, a landlady... And a novelist.
@nclarke14 on the lengths 20th-century women writers had to go to make ends meet:
Norma Clarke - Her Family & Other Animals
Norma Clarke: Her Family & Other Animals - Barbara Comyns: A Savage Innocence by Avril Horner
literaryreview.co.uk