In 1929 Robert Graves (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Graves) went to live abroad permanently, vowing ‘never to make England my home again’. This is his superb account of his life up until that ‘bitter leave-taking’: from his childhood and desperately unhappy school days at Charterhouse, to his time serving as a young officer in the First World War that was […]
Goodbye to All That Read More »
In 1945 fifty-two papyrus texts, including gospels and other secret documents, were found by a local farmer named Mohammed al-Samman near the Upper Egyptian town of Nag Hammadi. They were concealed in an earthenware jar. These so-called ‘Gnostic’ writings were Coptic translations from the original Greek dating from the time of the New Testament and
The Gnostic Gospels by Elaine Pagels Read More »
In this book from 1961 Lewis Mumford (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lewis_Mumford) argues for a world not in which technology reigns, but rather in which it achieves a balance with nature. His ideal vision is what can be described as an ‘organic city’, where culture is not usurped by technological innovation but rather thrives with it. Mumford contrasts these cities with
The City in History by Lewis Mumford Read More »
No Logo (1999) by Naomi Klein (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naomi_Klein and http://www.naomiklein.org/main) employs journalistic savvy and personal testament to detail the insidious practices and far-reaching effects of corporate marketing. It also looks at the powerful potential of a growing activist sect that may alter the course of the 21st century. First published before the World Trade Organization protests in Seattle, this is an infuriating, inspiring,
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Barely two hundred and fifty years ago a man condemned of attempting to assassinate the King of France was drawn and quartered in a grisly spectacle that suggested an unmediated duel between the violence of the criminal and the violence of the state. This groundbreaking book by the most influential French philosopher since Sartre compels us
Discipline and Punish by Michel Foucault Read More »
Almost a decade in the making by Tony Judt (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_Judt), this much-anticipated grand history of postwar Europe from one of the world’s most esteemed historians and intellectuals is a singular achievement. Postwar (2005) is the first modern history that covers all of Europe, both east and west, drawing on research in six languages to sweep
Hidden Agendas (1998) is one of John Pilger’s (http://johnpilger.com/ and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Pilger) most substantial and challenging books. It strips away the layers of deception, dissembling language and omission that prevent us from understanding how the world really works. From the invisible corners of Tony Blair’s New Britain to Burma, Vietnam, Australia and South Africa, Pilger unravels the
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This volume contains both parts of Muggeridge’s (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malcolm_Muggeridge and http://www.malcolmmuggeridge.org/) acclaimed memoir – The Green Stick (1972) and The Infernal Grove (1973), plus the start to an unfinished third volume entitled The Right Eye. An international throng of writers, politicians, soldiers, spies, traitors and eccentrics jostles in these page from Attlee to Wodehouse via Burgess and Philby, Churchill,
Chronicles of Wasted Time Read More »
An autobiography from 1982 delivered with the charm and gentle irony that became the trademark of this famously well travelled documentary maker (http://www.alanwhicker.co.uk/ and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Whicker) 390 pages in Elm Tree Books ISBN 978-0241107478 Alan Whicker
Within Whicker’s World Read More »
