Maya Angelou - a life in pictures
Maya Angelou has died aged 86. Look back below at some prominent moments from the author and activist's lifeObituary: Maya AngelouAngelou in quotes: 'Try to be a rainbow in someone's cloud'Podcast...
View ArticleMaya Angelou: a titan who lived as though there were no tomorrow
America has not just lost a talented Renaissance woman and a gifted raconteur it has lost a connection to its recent pastMaya Angelou: a life in picturesMemories: Maya Angelou's majesty, according to...
View ArticleMaya Angelou quotes: 15 of the best
With the death of Maya Angelou, we lose the immense wisdom of the celebrated African American author, poet and civil activist. These quotes say a lot about who she was and what she stood for. Which...
View ArticleBeowulf: A Translation and Commentary review JRR Tolkien's long-lost translation
Tolkien's version of the Old English epic, along with selections from his Oxford lectures and invented texts showcase a rare mix of linguistic scholarship and literary imagination"FRODO LIVES!" I read...
View ArticleMaya Angelou's majesty, according to you: 'how can you love someone if you...
Chance encounters, constant inspiration, songs on a train readers share their moments and memories with a legend Gary Younge: My time with Maya - 'fine as wine in summertime' Tayari Jones: 'Her love of...
View ArticleRobert Burns's suspected bipolar disorder used to fight illness's stigma
Glasgow symposium uses the poet's tempestuous life in presentations about the condition that some feel may have fuelled his workThe possibility that Scotland's best-loved poet Robert Burns may have...
View ArticleDylan Thomas centenary - books podcast special
Steven Morris listens to memories of Dylan Thomas in Swansea and at the Laugharne festival and Hilly Janes discusses his poetry and his much-mythologised life Continue reading...
View ArticleRosemary Tonks, the lost poet
Rosemary Tonks was a feted poet, trenchant reviewer and literary socialite. And then she 'disappeared'. Following her death last month, Neil Astley traces her extraordinary storyThe "disappearance" of...
View ArticleThe Saturday Poem: Addiction to an Old Mattress
by Rosemary TonksNo, this is not my life, thank God worn out like this, and crippled by brain-fag;Obsessed first by one person, and then(Almost at once) most horribly besotted by another;These...
View ArticleFree Thinking: PJ O'Rourke, Steven D Levitt, Stephen J Dubner; Today review
A trio of great minds hit the stage together while Clive James proved an engaging, kindly and moving presenceFree Thinking (R3) | iPlayerToday R4 | iPlayerOlder men get a rotten press, often from me....
View ArticleSeriously ill Clive James puts in a bravura performance at London literary...
Former Observer TV critic defies cancer to wow an audience with wit and eruditionClive James blew into London on Saturday with a quiver full of highly polished barbs, of the kind he deployed when he...
View ArticleJeremy Paxman on the Forward prize for poetry
Poets have to start engaging more with the general public, says the outgoing Newsnight presenter Continue reading...
View ArticleJeremy Paxman says poets must start engaging with ordinary people
Outgoing Newsnight presenter, judging Forward prize for poetry, says poetry has 'rather connived at its own irrelevance'Shelley had it that "poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world", and...
View ArticlePoems of the week: Selima Hill
Four short and sharp looks at the social pressures weighing on young women are both witty and unsettlingSelima Hill's new collection The Sparkling Jewel of Naturism has an intriguing, faintly sexual...
View ArticleIs Jeremy Paxman right about new poetry's inaccessibility?
'Poets now seem to be talking to other poets... [not] people as a whole,' said the outgoing Newsnight presenter and Forward prize judge. Really? Help us compile examples of poems in film, TV, radio or...
View ArticleSam Greenlee obituary
US writer and poet best known for his controversial novel and film The Spook Who Sat By the DoorThe legacy of the writer Sam Greenlee, who has died aged 83, is in the cultural and philosophical impact...
View ArticleJeremy Paxman doesn't see that poetry is felt, not fathomed | George Szirtes
The Newsnight presenter berates poets for their obscurity. But life is not just about rational statementsJeremy Paxman, as chair of this year's Forward prize, has been doing his provocative best to...
View ArticleMaya Angelou's memorial service to be live-streamed
The general public will be able to watch a webcast of the otherwise private occasion on Saturday 7 June in North CarolinaMaya Angelou: A life in picturesThe private memorial service for Maya Angelou,...
View ArticleCreator of @everyword explains the life and death of a Twitter experiment
In 2007, Adam Parrish created an enormously popular account to tweet the English language a word at a time. He explains why he did it and what he learnedAfter seven years and 109,000 tweets,...
View ArticleA review of Philip Larkin's new poetry: from the archive, 6 June 1974
High Windows contains some of the poet's most famous works High Windows, by Philip Larkin (Faber, £1.40).Disinvolvement, decrepitude and death - these are the main themes of Philip Larkin's new volume...
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