c o n t e n t s f e b r ua r y 2 0 1 2 • i s s u e 3 9 5

Editor Nancy Sladek Deputy Editor Tom Fleming Editor-at-Large Jeremy Lewis Senior Editor Jonathan Beckman Editorial Assistants Frank Brinkley • Tom Williams Contributing Editors Michael Burleigh Sara Wheeler • Philip Womack Advertising Manager Terry Finnegan Classified Advertising David Sturge Founding Father Auberon Waugh Cover Illustration Chris Riddell

The Literary Review, incorporating Quarto, is published monthly from: 44 Lexington Street, London W1F 0LW • Tel: 020 7437 9392 Fax: 020 7734 1844 • ISSN 0144 4360 © All subscription enquiries and changes of address to: Literary Review Subscriptions, FREEPOST RSJB-SUGY-ZKRA, Impakt MMD Ltd, 3-4 Pylon Way, Croydon CR0 4XX • Tel: 020 8683 7151 All advertising enquiries to: Terry Finnegan, Literary Review, 44 Lexington Street, London W1F 0LW • Tel: 020 7437 9392 Printed in the United Kingdom by: Henry Ling Ltd, at the Dorset Press, Dorchester DT1 1HD • Tel: 01305 251 066 Distributed to newsagents worldwide by: COMAG Specialist, Tavistock Works, Tavistock Rd, West Drayton, Middlesex, UB7 7QX • Tel: 01895 433 800 Distributed to bookshops by: Central Books, 99 Wallis Road, London E9 5LN • Tel: 020 8986 4854 Subscriptions: theliteraryreview@warnes.co.uk Editorial: editorial@literaryreview.co.uk www.literaryreview.co.uk • @lit_review Designed by Cog Design Literary Review is set in Adobe Caslon and Janet. The latter is a digitisation of an engraved typeface designed by the artist and typographer Reynolds Stone, and named after his wife.

Literary Review | f e b r u a r y 2 0 1 2 2

f r om the p u l p i t 1 Nick Cohen l i t e r a r y l i v e s 5 Daniel Johnson

Joseph Roth: A Life in Letters (Ed) Michael Hofmann 7 Kevin Jackson

Night Thoughts: The Surreal Life of the Poet David Gascoyne Robert Fraser 8 Jay Parini

Alive Inside the Wreck: A Biography of Nathanael West Joe Woodward 10 Stephen Amidon

Hemingway’s Boat: Everything He Loved in Life, and Lost, 1934–1961 Paul Hendrickson 11 D J Taylor

Amateurs in Eden: The Story of a Bohemian Marriage – Nancy and Lawrence Durrell Joanna Hodgkin 12 Catherine Peters on Dickens at 200 14 Paul Bailey

A Card from Angela Carter Susannah Clapp f or e i g n pa rts 15 Michael Burleigh

Algeria: France’s Undeclared War Martin Evans 16 Donald Rayfield

Belarus: The Last European Dictatorship Andrew Wilson 17 Jonathan Mirsky

Travels in China Roland Barthes 18 Jonathan Fenby

The Death of Mao: The Tangshan Earthquake and the Birth of the New China James Palmer 20 Oleg Gordievsky

Mafia State: How One Reporter Became an Enemy of the Brutal New Russia Luke Harding h i st or y 21 Paul Bew

Bloody Sunday: Truths, Lies and the Saville Inquiry Douglas Murray 22 David Pryce-Jones

Patriot of Persia: Muhammad Mossadegh and a Very British Coup Christopher de Bellaigue 24 John Gray

Thinking the Twentieth Century Tony Judt with Timothy Snyder c o n t e n t s

25 Christopher Caldwell

God ’s Jury: The Inquisition and the Making of the Modern World Cullen Murphy 26 Roderick Bailey

Lisbon: War in the Shadows of the City of Light, 1939–1945 Neill Lochery 27 Anne Sebba

Magnificent Obsession: Victoria, Albert and the Death that Changed the Monarchy Helen Rappaport 28 Jerry Brotton

The Serpent & the Lamb: Cranach, Luther and the Making of the Reformation Steven Ozment b e l l e s l e t t r e s 30 Seamus Perry

The Poetry of Translation: From Chaucer & Petrarch to Homer & Logue Matthew Reynolds 31 Kathryn Hughes

Chick Lit and Postfeminism Stephanie Harzewski 32 Frances Wilson

Cruelty & Laughter: Forgotten Comic Literature and the Unsentimental Eighteenth Century Simon Dickie a rt & f i lm 33 Paul Johnson

Michelangelo: The Achievement of Fame, 1475–1534 Michael Hirst 34 Elaine Showalter The First Pop Age Hal Foster 35 Jonathan Romney

Noriko Smiling Adam Mars-Jones • Zona: A Book About a Film About a Journey to a Room Geoff Dyer b i o g r a p hy & memoir 37 Jane Ridley on the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee 38 Roderick Matthews

Ashoka: The Search for India’s Lost Emperor Charles Allen 39 David Cesarani

The Patagonian Hare: A Memoir Claude Lanzmann g e n e r a l 42 Steve Fuller

What It Means to Be Human: Reflections from 1791 to the Present Joanna Bourke 43 Bryan Appleyard

Together: The Rituals, Pleasures and Politics of Cooperation Richard Sennett

44 John Sutherland

Losing It: In Which an Aging Professor Laments His Shrinking Brain William Ian Miller 45 Richard Holloway

Religion for Atheists: A Non-Believer’s Guide to the Uses of Religion Alain de Botton 46 Praveen Swami

Heaven on Earth: A Journey through Shari‘a Law Sadakat Kadri 48 Martin Vander Weyer

Grand Pursuit: The Story of Economic Genius Sylvia Nasar 49 Philip Eade

Titanic Lives: Migrants and Millionaires, Conmen and Crew Richard Davenport-Hines 50 A C Grayling

What Are Universities For? Stefan Collini f i c t i on 51 Adrian Turpin

Waiting for Sunrise William Boyd 52 Toby Lichtig

The Prague Cemetery Umberto Eco 53 Thomas Marks on four new collections of short stories 54 Michael Arditti

Jack Holmes and His Friend Edmund White 55 Jonathan Barnes on five first novels 56 Simon Baker

The Greatcoat Helen Dunmore 57 Lucy Lethbridge

The Man who Rained Ali Shaw 57 Suzi Feay

The Roundabout Man Clare Morrall 58 Tom Williams

The Revelations Alex Preston 59 Anna Aslanyan

All is Song Samantha Harvey

47 LR Bookshop 60 Jessica Mann Crime 61 Crossword 62 Poetry Competition 63 Lucy Popescu Silenced Voices 64 LR Classifieds f e b r u a r y 2 0 1 2 | Literary Review 3