Keith Waterhouse
The Naked Cat & Naked Dog
Dogwatching
By Desmond Morris
Jonathan Cape 106pp £4.95
Catwatching
By Desmond Morris
Jonathan Cape 106pp £4.95
After a TV programme on the horrors of nuclear war, a woman rang the BBC to ask whether fallout shelters could be fitted with cat-flaps. It is the kind of item that gets into This England (it did) as an example of our native dottiness. It could equally well have gone into The Bookseller as an indicator of the potential audience for cat books, which hog the shelves in even more profusion than royal wedding books.
When in doubt, the founder of my publishers, the late Michael Joseph, would always publish a cat book. Dog books he was more wary of, and rightly so. Cat lovers love all cats. Dog lovers are divisible by breed. I shall be surprised if Catwatching does not easily outsell its
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