Louisa May Alcott is best known as the author of Little Women. But she was also a noted essayist who wrote on a wide range of subjects, including her father’s failed utopian commune, life as a Civil War nurse and her experience as a young woman sent to work in service to alleviate her family’s poverty. Blending gentle satire with reportage and emotive biography, these essays show Alcott to be one of the sharpest wits in American literature.
First published in 1964, Modern Buildings in London is a celebration of the city’s post-war architecture by the famously untrained critic Ian Nairn. Written ‘by a layman for laymen’, Nairn’s take on 260 buildings that were instantly recognisable as ‘modern’ includes descriptions of classic designs such as the Barbican, the former BBC Television Centre, as well as schools, ambulance stations, car parks and even care homes.
An urgent final work from the award-winning author whose writing, fieldwork and mentorship inspired generations of writers and activists. With an introduction by Rebecca Solnit that speaks to Lopez’s keen attention to the world, including its spiritual dimensions, Embrace Fearlessly the Burning World opens our minds and sounds to the important of being wholly present to the beauty and complexity of life.
Taking us on a journey from the court of Louis XIV to TikTok’s avant apocalypse, Fashion: A Manifesto scrutinises fashion from a number of angles: historically, psychologically, politically, environmentally, even linguistically, to open up questions about the ways in which it works, both for and against us, and looks forward to a future where our clothes treat us – not to mention the planet – a great deal more kindly.
Todd McEwen grew up in Southern California. As the son of relatively normal people, he had no in with Hollywood, a mere thirteen miles away, try as he might. This is a kid who loved the movies so much, he got up at 4.30 in the morning to watch Laurel and Hardy. A kid who made his father project 8mm cartoons onto the family’s dining room curtains so they could be slowly parted, just like at a real cinema. A guy who based his philosophy of life on Captain Nemo, and has watched Chinatown over sixty times. So far.
Children are a wonder – a miracle – and everyone has an opinion on how we should raise them. From novelists to paediatricians; from modern parenting ‘experts’ to child psychologists, Tiny Feet is the first anthology of its kind, showcasing a range of the most influential writing about children over the past four-hundred years. Introduced by award-winning author and illustrator Lauren Child.
Examining the Jungian concept of the midlife crisis, and the lives of prominent figures who endured it (including Abraham Lincoln and Marie Curie), psychoanalyst Andrew Jamieson shows how there is an evolutionary purpose behind this rite of passage which – once traversed – holds the key to our prosperity
In this series of brilliant autobiographical essays, A. J. Lees takes us on a grand tour of his neurological career, giving the reader insight into the art of listening, observation and imagination that the best neurologists still rely on to heal minds and fix brains.
For centuries cats have been venerated and mistrusted in equal measure. Through memoir, fiction, letters and poems, the writers in these pages celebrate cats and their curious ways. Introduced by Margaret Atwood, this beautiful gift book contains writing by Alice Walker, Edward Gorey, Mary Gaitskill, Caitlin Moran, Ernest Hemingway, Nikola Tesla, John Keats, Muriel Spark, Lynne Truss, Hilaire Belloc, Guy du Maupassant, Rebecca West and more. Plus: photography from Elliot Ross.
A curated selection of chilling ghost stories from world literature, introduced and edited by broadcaster Stephen Johnson. What these tales of the supernatural have in common is the theme of taking a ‘wrong turning’ in which the protagonists are made to face their darkest fears. In the spirit of a fireside storyteller, each tale has an afterword by Stephen Johnson, to suggest what the story might really be telling us.
A collection of twelve provocative essays by the philosopher and political thinker Roger Scruton. Each ‘confession’ reveals an aspect of the author’s thinking that his critics would probably have advised him to keep to himself. This diverse collection includes essays on art, music, architecture, government, social media, and culture.
