The unbearable weight of the literary canon
Daunted by the breadth of the material, I fear I will never be well read enough.
ByLiterature
Immerse yourself in the captivating world of literature with our collection of articles, offering literary analysis, book recommendations, author spotlights, and thought-provoking discussions that celebrate the written word.
Kazuo Ishiguro’s everyday dystopia
Never Let Me Go was once dismissed by critics for its “dear-diary” prose, but 20 years later the novelist’s masterwork…
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The Leopard and the ruins of history
Newly adapted by Netflix, Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa’s novel is a lesson in the anarchic motions of our times.
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Dante’s divine autofiction
How the Italian poet’s search for self-knowledge changed the course of literature.
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Eimear McBride’s literature of desire
The Irish author’s exhilarating fourth novel, The City Changes Its Face, proves there is nobody writing sex like her.
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The death of the British Catholic novel
Catholicism gave English literature something it needs to rediscover.
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Han Kang’s radical empathy
As with all the Nobel Prize-winning South Korean writer’s stories, We Do Not Part rejects escapism to reach into the…
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How WG Sebald found his form
His studies of Austrian writers, at times more fiction than fact, offer a guide to the artist he would become.
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How we misread The Great Gatsby
The greatness of F Scott Fitzgerald’s novel lies in its details. But they are often overlooked.
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Yukio Mishima’s lifelong death wish
The Japanese writer and nationalist, a darling of the US far right, was haunted by the aesthetics of self-destruction.
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Elsa Morante’s wild, compelling fiction
This vivid story of class and family by the rediscovered Italian novelist was where Elena Ferrante “discovered what literature can…
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25 books to read in 2025
From AI to the Beatles and from Pope Francis to Jung Chang, here are the new books to look out…
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How 4chan became the home of the elite reader
The left is losing its grip on the literary realm.
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In search of a new 20th-century canon
In Stranger Than Fiction, the American editor Edwin Frank seeks to tell the story of the modern novel through an…
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James Salter’s machismo myth
The all-action American novelist is praised for his virile heroics – but it was his instinct for “the feminine” that…
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Anthony Burgess’s Napoleon complex
In Napoleon Symphony, the life of the French statesman was transformed into a virtuoso romp that still dazzles 50 years…
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The case against George Orwell
As with DH Lawrence, Orwell’s private life has imperilled his reputation. Is there a way back?
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Why the novel matters
We read and write fiction because it asks impossible questions, and leads us boldly into the unknown.
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Joan Didion vs Eve Babitz
Lili Anolik’s dual biography reveals the writers’ vicious battle to be the true voice of 1970s California.
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Quitting social media gave me a new creed: only disconnect
Online, intimacy is imagined and mystery non-existent. It’s time to lose our smartphones and find ourselves again.
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