Writing

Book review: ‘The Gifts of Reading’ by Robert Macfarlane

The joy of giving books as presents.
Book review: ‘Jesus Christ Kinski’ by Benjamin Myers

A novel about a film about a performance about Jesus.
Book review: ‘Domination’ by Alice Roberts

How the Christian Church rose to prominence in the wake of the Roman Empire.
Rich Text newsletter No. 37: ‘These people knew mammoths!’

Ice age art • Robert Macfarlane • Kathleen Jamie • medieval poems • lichen • Barbarian Conspiracy • the Shipping Forecast • escaping the entropy • and more…
Book review: ‘The Penguin Book of the Prose Poem’ by Jeremy Noel-Tod

An anthology of poems without line breaks.
Book review: ‘Sir Gawain and the Green Knight’ by Simon Armitage

An excellent alliterative translation of a medieval masterpiece.
Book review: ‘The Shortest History of Italy’ by Ross King

An excellent short history of an excellent country.
Book review: ‘The Red Tenda of Bologna’ by John Berger

A short memoir-cum-essay on the city of Bologna and an enigmatic uncle.
No cause for alarm

Don’t worry: I haven’t been taken seriously ill; I’ve just updated my profile photo.
Dream advice

Writing advice from an oneiric avatar.
Book review: ‘The Gold Machine’ by Iain Sinclair

Tracking the ancestors from Highlands to coffee colony.
Book review: ‘Bibliomaniac’ by Robin Ince

Writer and comedian tours 104 bookshops, buying far too many books as he does so.