The Saturday poem: Blue Poles (after Jackson Pollock)
by Caitríona O’ReillyFreedom is a prison for the representative savant addled on bath-tub gin and with retinas inflamedfrom too long staring into the Arizona sun or into red dirt which acknowledges no...
View ArticleBest holiday reads 2015
From a portrait of modern-day Britain at work to New York in the 1940s, taking in the secret world of Fifa and tales of female friendships, authors, critics and other bookworms tell us which books they...
View ArticlePoem of the week: Psalm by John Dennison
An unsettling monologue addressed to a child first arouses our suspicions, then invites us to have faithPsalmYou ok, sweetheart? What’s this, what’s this?You lost someone, sweetheart? Your mum?Where’s...
View ArticlePioneering scholars, poets and radicals - in pictures
The publisher Blackwell’s was once home to authors including JRR Tolkien, Dorothy L Sayers and Vera Brittain. It also published many lesser-known radical writers and illustrators. Here is a selection...
View ArticleTips, links and suggestions: what are you reading this week?
Your space to discuss the books you are reading and what you think of themScroll down for our favourite literary linksRead more Tips, links and suggestions blogsWelcome to this week’s blog, and...
View ArticleJoseph Coelho’s top 10 new poetry books every child must read
The performance poet and winner of this year’s CLPE children’s poetry award picks the poetry collections that every child should grow up withHere are my top 10 new poetry books that every child must...
View ArticleReading American cities: books about Atlanta
The literature of Atlanta reflects a history steeped in violence and racial tension. From Gone with the Wind to The Walking Dead, Anna Schachner explores the essential literary companions for the...
View ArticleWords fail us: dementia and the arts
With nearly one million Britons in the grip of dementia, it’s hardly surprising that writers and artists should increasingly tackle the subject. But can the arts ever illuminate a condition that by its...
View ArticlePoem of the week: When Six O’Clock Comes and Another Day Has Passed by...
An exploration of the intense connection between mother and child, lost in the rhythmical somnolence of routine, cleverly avoids clicheWhen Six O’Clock Comes and Another Day Has Passedthe baby who can...
View ArticleJames Tate obituary
Iconoclastic and original American poet who won the Pulitzer prizeJames Tate, who has died aged 71, was one of the most original and inventive American poets of his era, whose sense of humour and love...
View ArticleChenjerai Hove obituary
Leading Zimbabwean novelist and poet who left his native country to live in exile in the west in 2001Chenjerai Hove, who has died aged 59 of liver failure, was a leading Zimbabwean novelist and poet,...
View ArticleMove over Bob Dylan: you don't use anywhere near as many words as rappers
A new study has looked at the vocabulary used in bestselling artists’ work, and it has found that Eminem uses 4,000 more words than DylanHe may be the most revered wordsmith in the classic rock...
View ArticleOur coastal punk poet: John Cooper Clarke on his love of seaside towns
The National Trust has commissioned the poet to write verse in praise of the coastline he has circumnavigated ‘thousands of times’ and where he first experienced the wonder of rock’n’rollMost of us...
View ArticleThe 10 best beach moments in culture
Don’t tarry at the water’s edge – take the plunge with some of the beach’s hottest starring roles in cultureYo La Tengo, 2003 Continue reading...
View ArticleWhy WB Yeats devotees in Ireland are echoing a long list of grave concerns
Recent revelations that WB Yeats’s remains still reside on the French Riviera where he was first buried, and not in County Sligo, continue a tradition of tussles over the ownership of writers’...
View ArticleThe Saturday poem: Finally
by Andrew McMillana day will come whenwoken by the xylophoneof sunthroughblindsyou’ll realisethat the beach was not the placewhere horses tore the sandto ribbonContinue reading...
View ArticleOn my radar: Greta Gerwig’s cultural highlights
The mumblecore star on Colm Tóibín’s writing about poetry, the surprising allure of Peaky Blinders and the restoration of Satyajit Ray’s cinema classicsGreta Gerwig, 31, was born in California. After...
View ArticleAppreciation: Chenjerai Hove, 1956-2015
Generous and inspiring, the prolific Zimbabwean writer and activist, who has died in exile in Norway, should be hailed as a national treasureHe promised his mother he would not die in foreign lands....
View ArticlePoem of the week: from I Sing the Body Electric by Walt Whitman
This best known and most enthralling of Whitman’s poems is a praise-song to physicality that raises questions about the soulO my body! I dare not desert the likes of you in other men and women, nor the...
View ArticleKanye West’s not got Dylan’s thesaurus blues | Letters
Your front-page article on the range of language used by various songwriters was interesting but showed little understanding of Bob Dylan’s greatness as a lyricist (Report, 24 July). One of Dylan’s...
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