LITERARY BENT – Writing at its best

William Gerald Golding (William Golding | Official website) was an English novelist, playwright, and poet. Best known for his debut novel Lord of the Flies (1954), he published another twelve volumes of fiction in his lifetime. In 1980, he was awarded the Booker Prize for Rites of Passage, the first novel in what became his sea trilogy, To the […]

Jon McGregor (Staff Listing – The University of Nottingham) is a British novelist and short story writer. In 2002, his first novel, ‘If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things‘, was longlisted for the Booker Prize. His second and fourth novels, ‘So Many Ways To Begin‘ and ‘Reservoir 13‘ were also longlisted for the Booker Prize in

Set against the backdrop of the 1975 State of Emergency in India, A Fine Balance intricately weaves the lives of four main characters who share a cramped apartment in Mumbai. The author explores the harsh realities of the political climate, showcasing the effects of systemic oppression and caste violence. The spirited widow Dina Dalal, the tailors Ishvar and Omprakash, and

A meticulously-observed drama of class warfare, E.M. Forster’s ​Howards End explores the conflict inherent within English society, unveiling the character of a nation as never before. A chance acquaintance brings together the preposterous bourgeois Wilcox family and the clever, cultured and idealistic Schlegel sisters. As clear-eyed Margaret develops a friendship with Mrs Wilcox, the impetuous Helen

The chief source material for the guerrillas in this tale is the life of ‘Michael X’ (born Michael de Freitas, of mixed race, in Trinidad of a Portuguese father). (Michael X – Wikipedia) Adopting a black Muslim identity, de Freitas worked in London as a thug for Peter Rachman. Then, seeing the incontrovertible truth of

Graham Swift (Graham Swift – Literature) is a Booker Prize winning novelist. It was his novel ‘Last Orders’ that took the 1996 prize whilst also becoming the joint winner of the 1996 James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction. His novel Waterland (1983) won the Guardian Fiction Prize. Both of these have been adapted for the screen,

By 2024 it has been 71 years since the publication in 1953 of ‘The Adventures of Augie March‘ by Saul Bellow (Saul Bellow | US news | The Guardian). The book is still held up by many critics as a contender for the accolade of the great American novel. Augie March is Jewish in Chicago

Marie-Henri Beyle (1783 – 1842), better known by his pen-name Stendhal, wrote this novel at a pointless period in his life, during fifty-three days late in 1838. He was serving at the time as a minor French official in Italy – the Consul at Civitavecchia. Beyle was a veteran of several Napoleonic campaigns and was one of the survivors

Margaret Atwood (http://margaretatwood.ca/ and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Atwood) has been much in the news for her latest book ‘The Testaments’, the joint winner of The Man Booker Prize 2019. If you are new to this top rank author, I’d recommend  Atwood at the height of her powers in her 1996 novel ‘Alias Grace’. There’s nothing like the spectacle of female