If one could distill films into particular formulas, the equation in this case might read: (Woody Allen x Jean-Luc Godard) – existentialism = the contemporary New York bourgeois comedy, Frances Ha. Noah Baumbach’saesthetically appealing film is at once a homage to, and a film inspired by,the style of French independent filmmakers and, by allowing audiences Read More
save me from the demon who jumps out of the third graveyard and eats the memories of children. (“Small nervous prayer”) This dark image is perhaps typical of what Ethiopia conjures for today’s European reader. Too recent spectres of drought, famine and attendant griefs cast long shadows over a culturally rich land; its ancient wonders, Read More
The delight of any selected works should be variety and range. The Church of Omnivorous Light, the first volume of Wrigley’s to be published in the UK, does not disappoint. Drawn from over thirty years of poetic output, Wrigley’s voice encompasses: the natural and the social, the personal and the public, the sensual and the Read More
Being more partial to a good thriller or murder mystery, I was prepared to dislike Me Before You by Jo Jo Moyes on sight. And I did. The cover is a soppy, girly pink, more suited to a birthday card for a maiden aunt than a novel. The first few pages are given over to Read More
Morag Muir is a remarkably prolific artist who has demonstrated over the past 30 years her dedication to art. She has managed the difficult feat of balancing a focused and contagious enthusiasm for painting with a supportive attitude to other artists’ creativity, and a careful tending of her family. For a time she also held Read More
Paul Muldoon, winner of the Pulitzer, Griffin and TS Eliot prizes and highly acclaimed for his many poetry collections, including Quoof (1983) and Moy Sand and Gravel (2002), has returned to poetry’s lyrical roots with the publication of The Word On The Street. Written to be set to music, many of these rock lyrics have been recorded by the Princeton Read More
Seven sections, each with seven poems, and each poem composed of seven couplets – sounds like an incantation? It isn’t. This is the formal structure of Damian Walford Davies’ new poetry collection, enticingly entitled, Witch. The witch hunt is chronicled in seven sections, each voiced in the first person by a single persona, except the third Read More
Lynn Michell’s novel White Lies explores the issues of truth and memory against the backdrop of Kenyan political history, whilst also more broadly exploring the place of the individual in pivotal historical moments. Michell’s story revolves around Eve, a middle aged woman caring for her aged and difficult father, David. In an attempt to make their time Read More
Edgar Allan Poe, the celebrated short fiction enthusiast, is often attributed the quote: “A short story must have a single mood and every sentence must build towards it.” David Constantine, for one, seems to have taken this to heart. In his fourth collection of stories, Tea at the Midland, Constantine has created an outstanding work in Read More
Beautifully woven narratives, coloured by the traditions and folklore of the poet’s native Trinidad and Tobago, form Fawzia Kane’s debut collection, Tantie Diablesse; theycombine to create an extremely engaging read. While her poetry contains autobiographical elements, Kane does not permit these moments to overpower the collection, thus allowing the poetry to achieve a sense of Read More