Every year, thousands of people come tattarrattating at the doors of Dublin to visit the James Joyce Centre and then presumably the Irish Writers Centre (they are only blocks from each… Read more »

When, late last year, the Cabinet of the South London borough of Lambeth decided to convert Herne Hill’s Carnegie Library into a “healthy living centre,” people got angry. And they acted… Read more »

The second Folio Prize for Fiction is awarded to an American for his a second novel: Family Life by Akhil Sharma. Sharma’s rendering of an American family is deemed “lucid,… Read more »

It was the unexpected hit of 2013, a memoir written by the one-time nanny to the editor of the London Review of Books, Mary-Kay Wilmers. Nina Stibbe’s Love, Nina told… Read more »

One person was missing from yesterday’s Folio Prize announcement, and it wasn’t a snubbed author. Saturday, just before the shortlist announcement, the owner and chairman of the Folio Society passed away. Lord Gavron was 84 and… Read more »

Events to celebrate the life of Thomas Merton, the poet, Trappist monk, religious philosopher, translator and social critic, are planned around the world—from Ireland to Iowa, to Sydney and Brazil—to mark… Read more »

“There are many things I regret doing and being a judge for the Booker prize is one of them”. This is Paul Bailey, speaking about being a judge in 1982,… Read more »

“Highbrow gambling” is on the rise: Alex Donohue, spokesman for Ladbrokes, reports that betting on the Man Booker Prize with his company is up from £4,000 in 2005 to £15,000… Read more »

The shortlist for the 2013 Man Booker Prize, Britain’s most prestigious literary award, has been released. The six finalists are: We Need New Names by NoViolet Bulawayo The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton… Read more »