Freedom, Books, Flowers & The Moon

In this bonus TLS long read, the writer Joyce Carol Oates explores the quintessential American minimalism of Walker Evans.www.the-tls.co.uk/articles/walker-evans-svetlana-alpers-review-joyce-carol-oatesIf you would like to listen to more audio articles from The TLS, you can do so on The TLS website or the News Over Audio app.A special subscription offer for TLS podcast listeners: www.the-tls.co.uk/buy/pod  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by Adam Watt, Professor of French and Comparative Literature at the University of Exeter, to mark 150 years since the birth of Marcel Proust, whose legacy seems stronger than ever; Sarah Lonsdale, the author of 'Rebel Women Between the Wars', re-considers ‘Diary of a Provincial Lady’, a funny novel about interwar life in deepest Devon whose darker tones tend to be overlooked; plus, Mary Beard on new developments at the Colosseum.A special subscription offer for TLS podcast listeners: www.the-tls.co.uk/buy/podProducer: Ben Mitchell  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by the novelist Margaret Drabble to consider the ‘curiously free-floating reputation’ of Russell Hoban, whose adult novels, including ‘Riddley Walker’, now appear as Penguin Modern Classics; as twin exhibitions mark the centenary of the birth of the English sculptor, painter, writer, designer and illustrator Michael Ayrton, the critic Boyd Tonkin delves into the myth-laden maze of the artist’s thought‘From Oprah to Medusa: The endlessly various world of Russell Hoban’ by Margaret Drabble: www.the-tls.co.uk‘Michael Ayrton: A singular obsession’, Fry Art Gallery Too, Saffron Walden, until October 31st‘Michael Ayrton Centenary: Ideas, images, reflections’, edited by Justine Hopkins‘Celebrating Michael Ayrton: A centenary exhibition’, the Lightbox, Woking, until August 8thA special subscription offer for TLS podcast listeners: www.the-tls.co.uk/buy/podProducer: Ben Mitchell  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week: How far off is a world in which robots do most of our jobs? Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by Benjamin Schneider, a DPhil Candidate in Economic and Social History at Merton College, Oxford, to explore Artificial Intelligence, societal change, real and imagined, and the future of work; what will our writers, from Andrew Motion to Joyce Carol Oates, be reading this summer?; plus, it’s Independent Bookshop Week and the nominations came thick and fast… 'Summer books 2021 – Our contributors provide their seasonal reading lists' www.the-tls.co.uk/articles/summer-books-2021A special subscription offer for TLS podcast listeners: www.the-tls.co.uk/buy/podProducer: Ben Mitchell  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Lucy Dallas and Toby Lichtig are joined by Paul Griffiths to discuss the beauty and grace of Mozart, the untortured genius; David Edgerton talks us through the decline and fall of British coal mining and its relationship with the Labour Party; plus, new discoveries about Locke and Leviathan, obituary codes and the Buddha's wife'La Clemenza di Tito' by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart'Mozart in Prague' by Daniel E. Freeman'Mozart: The reign of love' by Jan Swafford'The Shadow of the Mine: Coal and the end of industrial Britain' by Huw Beynon and Ray Hudson'Yasodhara and the Buddha' by Vanessa R. SassonA special subscription offer for TLS podcast listeners: www.the-tls.co.uk/buy/podProducer: Ben Mitchell  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by Rosinka Chaudhuri, the author of ‘The Literary Thing: History, poetry and the making of a modern cultural sphere’, to discuss Rabindranath Tagore, who, in 1913, became the first non-white and non-European to win the Nobel Prize in Literature – since which he has been largely overlooked; Kate Kennedy, the author of ‘Dweller in the Shadows’, a new Life of the war poet Ivor Gurney, considers the “peculiarly direct, urgent intensity” of the later work, composed while confined in an asylum; plus, let’s hear it for independent bookshops'Rabindranath Tagore' by Bashabi Fraser 'The Cambridge Companion to Rabindranath Tagore', edited by Sukanta ChaudhuriA special subscription offer for TLS podcast listeners: www.the-tls.co.uk/buy/podProducer: Ben Mitchell  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Michael Caines are joined by the critic and literary scholar Marjorie Perloff to discuss an encyclopedic work that sets out to tackle ‘Art and thought in the Cold War’, from Jean-Paul Sartre to Elvis Presley; the English professor and literary critic Rohan Maitzen explores the meticulously observed world of Olivia Manning’s Balkan novels; plus, the unhappy story of a youthful romance between Eric Arthur Blair and Jacintha Buddicom, played out in poetry‘The Free World: Art and thought in the Cold War’ by Louis Menand‘The Balkan Trilogy’ by Olivia Manning‘“Dracula’s Daughter”: The rediscovery of a love poem for George Orwell’, by Eileen M. Hunt, and ‘Annotating George Orwell’, by D. J. Taylor ­– both in this week’s TLS: the-tls.co.ukA special subscription offer for TLS podcast listeners: www.the-tls.co.uk/buy/podProducer: Ben Mitchell  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by Gerri Kimber to discuss a bold new biography of D. H. Lawrence, 'the most judged writer of his age'; twenty-odd writers share their formative encounters with nature, including the novelists Maaza Mengiste and Ali Smith; plus, reviews of the television adaptation of Nancy Mitford’s 'The Pursuit of Love' and 'Harm', a new play about loneliness and social media addictionBurning Man: The ascent of D. H. Lawrence, by Frances Wilson'Sinister, sublime, exhausting, hungry – formative encounters with the natural world', see the-tls.co.uk The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford, BBC iPlayer'Harm' by Phoebe Eclair-Powell, the Bush Theatre, London  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by Devoney Looser, Regents Professor of English at Arizona State University and the author of ‘The Making of Jane Austen’, to discuss new research into the Austen family’s ties with slavery; Colin Grant, critic and writer, introduces Writers Mosaic, a new platform for writing and recordings; and Mary Beard considers the Roman love of temple-building and Euripides as reimagined by a poet and a comic-book illustrator.Jane Austen & Cowritersmosaic.org.uk/The Trojan Women: A comic book by Anne Carson and Rosanna BrunoThis episode of The TLS podcast is sponsored by Curtis Brown Creative. Go to www.curtisbrowncreative.co.uk to find out more about their creative writing courses. Use code YOURWRITINGSUMMER for £20 off any six-week course.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by Dinah Birch, Professor of English Literature at the University of Liverpool, to consider the work of Angela Thirkell, a kind of (but not really...) Anthony Trollope for the twentieth-century; the writer and audio documentarist Maria Margaronis considers the transformation of London’s Royal Court Theatre into a radical and moving “living newspaper”; plus, a library of the world’s literature that no censor can get to‘Angela Thirkell: A writer’s life’ by Anne Hall‘Living Newspaper’, Editions 6 and 7, Royal Court Theatre and royalcourttheatre.comThis episode of The TLS podcast is sponsored by Curtis Brown Creative. Go to www.curtisbrowncreative.co.uk to find out more about their creative writing courses.Use code YOURWRITINGSUMMER for £20 off any six-week course.A special subscription offer for TLS podcast listeners: www.the-tls.co.uk/buy/podProducer: Ben Mitchell  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by Ann Hallamore Caesar to mark 100 years since the première of the modernist masterpiece ‘Six Characters in Search of an Author’, considering it in the context of Luigi Pirandello’s life and work; Alexander Leissle reviews ‘Promises’, an intoxicating intergenerational collaboration between a jazz saxophonist and an electro producer; plus, a new poem by Andrew Motion, “At Low Tharston”, written in memory of the late Anthony Thwaite. 'Stories for the Years' by Luigi Pirandello, translated by Virginia Jewiss'The Notebooks of Serafino Gubbio' by Luigi Pirandello, translated by C. K. Scott Moncrieff'Promises' by Floating Points, Pharoah Sanders and the London Symphony Orchestra A special subscription offer for TLS podcast listeners: www.the-tls.co.uk/buy/pod  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by Patricia Craig, a writer and critic from Northern Ireland, who relates a sad and murky case of accidental killings, which took place during the Irish Civil War of the early 1920s; the TLS’s politics editor Toby Lichtig reviews a handful of recent films – works of documentary and fiction – with political stories, mostly atrocities, at their hearts; plus, a lost Proust manuscript finally sees the light of day. Can’t Get You Out of My Head, BBC iPlayerThe Mauritanian, Amazon PrimeThe Dissident, Amazon PrimeQuo Vadis, Aida?, Curzon Home CinemaLes Soixante-quinze feuillets et autres manuscrits inédits, by Marcel Proust, edited by Nathalie Mauriac Dyer, with a preface by Jean-Yves Tadié (Gallimard) A special subscription offer for TLS podcast listeners: www.the-tls.co.uk/buy/pod  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by Patricia J. Williams to discuss ‘Giving a Damn: Racism, romance and Gone with the Wind’, Williams’s deeply researched, and deeply felt, essay on the roots and legacy of racial injustice in the United States; Douglas Field considers a novel about a 'human mole' by Richard Wright, the African American writer best known for 'Native Son', which now sees the light of day, eighty years after it was written; plus Sylvia Plath’s domestic embellishments and the greatest novels of the twenty-first century to date (cont.)Giving a Damn: Racism, romance and 'Gone with the Wind' by Patricia J. Williams, published next week by TLS Books The Man Who Lived Underground by Richard WrightA special subscription offer for TLS podcast listeners: www.the-tls.co.uk/buy/pod  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by Emma Smith, Professor of Shakespeare Studies at Hertford College, Oxford, to discuss the new Arden 3 edition of ‘Measure for Measure’, one of the "problem plays" (word-bothers, en garde); the poet and translator Beverley Bie Brahic marks 200 years since the birth of Charles Baudelaire, whose extraordinary work seems bizarrely neglected; plus, Charlotte Mew, and the dangers of ancient Greek medicine.Measure for Measure, edited by A. R. Braunmuller and Robert N. Watson (Arden Shakespeare)The Invention of Medicine: From Homer to Hippocrates, by Robin Lane FoxThis Rare Spirit: A Life of Charlotte Mew, by Julia CopusA special subscription offer for TLS podcast listeners: www.the-tls.co.uk/buy/pod  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by Elaine Showalter, Professor Emerita of English at Princeton University, to discuss Blake Bailey’s keenly anticipated ‘Philip Roth: The biography’; and Alexandra Harris, the author of ‘Weatherland: Artist and writers under English skies’, considers a twenty-first century perspective on Joseph Wright of Derby, an eighteenth-century painter who is perhaps more darkness than light, more magic than science, and who deserves to be ranked among Europe’s greats.Philip Roth: The biography by Blake BaileyJoseph Wright of Derby: Painter of darkness by Matthew Craskewww.the-tls.co.uk  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Lucy Dallas and Toby Lichtig are joined by Mary Norris, a New Yorker and editor at - what else? - the New Yorker magazine, to discuss the changing life of the city and its inhabitants; Yoojin Grace Wuertz talks us through a film garlanded with Oscar nominations, Minari, which casts a new light on the immigrant story and the American Dream; plus, the week's fiction reviewsNew Yorkers: A city and its people in our time by Craig Taylor Pretend It's A City: NetflixThe Barbizon: The New York hotel that set women free by Paulina BrenMinari: Amazon Prime, Apple TV, etcA special subscription offer for TLS podcast listeners: www.the-tls.co.uk/buy/pod19  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by the historian Mark Mazower, who presents new approaches to the battle for Greek independence in 1821; Noreen Masud reviews a performance of Stevie Smith’s poems that conveys the unsettling power of her presence; plus, Paul Muldoon marks 400 years since the birth of Andrew Marvell with a new poem, ‘The Glow-Worm to the Mower’. Stevie Smith: Black March – Dead Poets Live, filmed at the Wanamaker Playhouse, available on Globe Player until April 5thPlease visit the TLS website to read Mark Mazower’s essay (including bibliography) and to find Paul Muldoon’s poem, as well as those by Angela Leighton and Will Harris.www.the-tls.co.uk  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by the critic and novelist Claire Lowdon to consider Vivian Gornick, an American writer of essays – on literature, politics, the self – that demonstrate a rare “ability to stand back and look at the world in which she finds herself, and then set it down calmly on paper”; the TLS’s poetry editor Camille Ralphs explores the fantasy role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons and some of the literature that inspired it; plus, libraries under threat (again), Unica Zürn gets her time in the sun, and the three greatest novels of the twenty-first century...so far.Taking a Long Look: Essays on culture, literature, and feminism in our time by Vivian GornickAppendix N: The eldritch roots of Dungeons and Dragons, edited by Peter Bebergalwww.the-tls.co.uk  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by Ann Pettifor, the economist and author of ‘The Case for the Green New Deal’, to discuss some inconvenient but incontrovertible truths left out of Bill Gates’s vision of the fight against climate change; Anna Aslanyan on a freewheeling account of the unpredictable life of the twentieth-century German writer Hasso Grabner; plus, re-reading Philip Larkin.How to Avoid a Climate Disaster by Bill GatesJourney through a Tragicomic Century: The Absurd Life of Hasso Grabner, by Francis Nenik, translated by Katy DerbyshireSubscribe to The TLS at https://www.the-tls.co.uk/buy/   See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by Edmund Gordon to review 'Klara and the Sun', Kazuo Ishiguro’s surprisingly hopeful new novel about an Artificial Friend; the world’s first poem about Superman (perhaps) was written by Vladimir Nabokov in 1942 but not published until now, in this week’s TLS – we discuss; and the medievalist Hetta Howes reviews two new translations of 'Beowulf', taking us back to the rich and troubling ambiguities of the original.Klara and the Sun, by Kazuo Ishiguro“The Man of To-morrow’s Lament”, a poem by Vladimir Nabokov, with commentary by Andrei BabikovBeowulf: A new translation by Maria Dahvana HeadleyBeowulf: In blank verse by Richard Hamer www.the-tls.co.uk  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.