book reviews and features
Meg Wolitzer: The Female Persuasion review - the many faces of feminism
Sunday, 03 June 2018
Meg Wolitzer’s 10th novel has been hailed as a breakthrough, a feminist blockbuster, an embodiment of the zeitgeist. (Nicole Kidman has bought the film rights, which goes to show.) But... Read more... |
Frank Gardner: Ultimatum review - topical terrorism
Sunday, 03 June 2018
The journalist Frank Gardner has turned to fiction to illuminate with imagination the world that he knows inside out from years of reporting. His biographical trajectory, from scholar of the... Read more... |
Sophie Mackintosh: The Water Cure review - on the discipline of survival
Sunday, 27 May 2018
A body can be pushed to the brink, to the point where thoughts flatten to a line of light, and come back from death, but the heart is complex and the damage it wreaks barely controllable. For... Read more... |
The World Of Moominvalley, Brighton Festival review - a fascinating insight into the world of Tove Jansson
Monday, 21 May 2018
It was no matter that journalist Daniel Hahn dropped out ill at the 11th hour of this "audience with" event. Author Philip Ardagh's deep knowledge and unflappable demeanour comfortably carried the... Read more... |
William Trevor: Last Stories review - final intimations
Sunday, 20 May 2018
An Irishman who spent more than half a century in London and then Devon, and a prolific writer – nearly 20 novels... Read more... |
Clancy Sigal: The London Lover review - a merry prankster's very long weekend
Sunday, 20 May 2018
To readers of newspapers and magazines, the name Clancy Sigal will be very familiar, probably as a film reviewer. Addicted to... Read more... |
Mario Vargas Llosa: The Neighbourhood review - a surprisingly sketchy telenovela
Sunday, 13 May 2018
Mario Vargas Llosa has written a thriller which opens eye-poppingly. Two wives, one staying over with... Read more... |
Christie Watson: The Language of Kindness review - tender memoir, impassioned indignation
Sunday, 06 May 2018
Anecdotal story-telling wrapped up in hypnotic prose, Christie Watson’s narrative is a gentle, emotive five-part layered package of reflection and indignation. It is part... Read more... |
John Gray: Seven Types of Atheism review - to believe, or not to believe
Sunday, 29 April 2018
To suggest an absence is to imply a presence. Philosophers, novelists, dictators, politicians – as well as almost every “ism” you can think of – take the stage in this absorbing, precisely and... Read more... |
Martin Gayford: Modernists & Mavericks review - people, places and paint
Sunday, 22 April 2018
Back in the early Sixties Lucian Freud was living in Clarendon Crescent, a condemned row of houses in... Read more... |
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It all started on 09/09/09. That memorable date, September 9 2009, marked the debut of theartsdesk.com.
It followed some...
Yoshitomo Nara, Hayward Gallery review - sickeningly cute ki...
It’s been a long time since an exhibition made me feel physically sick. The Hayward Gallery is currently hosting a retrospective of the...
Hespèrion XXI, Savall, QEH review - an evening filled with l...
For the first encore of the evening, it was not just the audience but the whole ensemble of Hespèrion XXI that was mesmerised as its leader,...
Album: Neil Young & the Chrome Hearts - Talkin' to...
When Neil Young releases a new album, you can be reasonably sure that you’ll get either a disc of melancholy singer-songwriter fare or a set of...
Samuel Arbesman: The Magic of Code review - the spark ages
The slightly overwrought subtitle, "How Digital Language Created and Connects Our World and Shapes Our Future", gives a...
Album: Mary Halvorson - About Ghosts
Although Mary Halvorson leads the sextet Amaryllis on About Ghosts, instrumentally, she does not place her guitar to the fore. The first...
A Midsummer Night's Dream, Bridge Theatre review - Nick...
It’s a sign of the inroads that the term “immersive” has made in theatreland that it now gets jokily namedropped at the...
Saul, Glyndebourne review - playful, visually ravishing desc...
This thrilling production of Saul takes Handel’s dramatisation of the Bible’s first Book of Samuel and paints it in...
theartsdesk at the Dublin International Chamber Music Festiv...
If, like me, chamber music isn’t your most frequent home, there are bound to be revelations of what for many are known masterpieces. Mine in...
