Donatella Della Ratta, Shooting a Revolution: Visual Media and Warfare in Syria
reviewed by Giovanni Vimercati
Unlike many accounts of what Western commentators referred to as the ‘Arab Springs’ and the creative insurgency that chronicled and simultaneously fuelled them, Shooting a Revolution: Visual Media and Warfare in Syria refrains from the acritical celebration of the alleged power of social media to undermine authoritarian regimes. Rather than simply a skeptical dismissal of the role grassroots media played in the Syrian uprising, Donatella Della Ratta has produced an in-depth study of its... [read more]
‘There is no democracy in any love relation: only mercy,’ wrote Gillian Rose in Love’s Work. There is no justice to be found; no rulebook with consequences for illicit behaviour. This is a terrifying truth even when relationships take place on a level playing field – you cannot sue a friend for betraying you – but when combined with structural inequalities of race, class and gender, it is deeply, unfathomably unfair. It is not fair, for example, that Asian men and black women receive... [read more]
‘Listen, before Hark,’ opens Sam Lipsyte’s latest novel, ‘was it ever harder to be human? Was it ever harder to believe in our world?’ Whether the question refers to the novel or its titular character, the answer appears to be a resounding no. Ravaged by exploitative capitalism and climate breakdown, Lipsyte’s world is our own as caught in funhouse mirrors, stretched and heightened into forms both hilarious and terrible. America is at war with Europe, fighting for control of... [read more]
The allegorical tradition in literary history has been an inexhaustibly rich source of speculation through the ages, and over the past century in particular. This is owing, at least in part, to the indeterminate status of allegory itself. Is it a genre in its own right? Is it a technique? Is it a literary temperament inherited from the performing arts, such as antique theatre and the medieval play of lamentation (Trauerspiel) of which Walter Benjamin wrote, or even from theology? How do its... [read more]
1. The Large Door started life as short story. The novel is better. I haven’t read the short story but The Large Door is better than most novels, and as novels are more often better than short stories (deeper, richer and more enriching) there is a high probability that this novel is better than the short story from which it is derived. Expanding short stories into novels is risky. There is a high probability of failure. Most novels that start out as short stories aren’t very good. Ian... [read more]
Writing about uprooting one’s life and going off to live in the wild has a long-established history in America – take Henry David Thoreau’s Walden, Edward Abbey’s Desert Solitaire and Jon Krakauer’s Into the Wild. But as with many long-established literary traditions, these illustrious narratives have been characterised by the expression and validation of a male-centric discourse, often implicit in the rugged individualism pursued through tales of self-discovery. This is where... [read more]
It has always seemed to me that of the two most notorious literary recluses of the late 20th century, JD Salinger and Thomas Pynchon, it was Salinger whose whereabouts provoked the most interest. Perhaps this is because Salinger was more visible in the early part of his career, and his withdrawal thus seemed more puzzling, or perhaps it was just that Catcher in the Rye had been such an overwhelming success (fleeing from which may have been one motivating factor in his behaviour) that fans... [read more]
Jean-Baptiste Del Amo, trans. Frank Wynne, Animalia
reviewed by Stanley Portus
At her father’s funeral, a young girl watches on as the villagers discuss what to do about a toad that has made its way into the open grave overnight and has been swimming back and forward in the mud. As the toad sits on top of the lowered coffin, the crowd agree it is a bad omen and the man cannot be buried with it there. The toad, one protests, is the devil. It is decided that the young girl is the only person small enough and in a bad enough state, in her scraggy, unwashed clothes, to be... [read more]
There’s an element of musical chairs to Lines Off, HugoWilliams’ first collection since I Knew the Bride in 2014. Whilst the music plays, Williams remembers the ‘faded photo strips’ of his past with characteristic swagger and self-effacing humour. He takes us back to his school coming out ball, ‘We were drinking and driving, barely surviving’; he takes us to Paris to fall for Tara Browne who ‘went out into the night, / dancing your crazy doodle-step/on the pedals of your Lotus... [read more]
Clare Carlisle, Philosopher of the Heart: The Restless Life of Søren Kierkegaard
reviewed by Ruby Guyatt
‘Joy is the present tense, with the whole emphasis upon the present.’ Clare Carlisle may not quote these words, written by Søren Kierkegaard in 1848, but her lyrical biography of the Danish philosopher-poet nevertheless performs them.
Unlike much writing about philosophy, Carlisle’s prose is imaginative and lucid; unlike most biographies, much of Philosopher of the Heart is written in the present tense, inviting the reader to accompany Kierkegaard as he walks Copenhagen’s cobbled... [read more]
