“… Mosley is inexorably entwined with the story of twentieth century politics as a whole, mirroring the highs and the lows, ricocheting from the machinations of high society to the violent desperation of the underclass, and taking in every major Parliamentary player in between… ”
Charles Bukowski : Bukowski: Born Into This
Pedro Blas Gonzalez Bukowski: Born Into This – Charles Bukowski See all books by Charles Bukowski at Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.com Charles Bukowski was a solitary man and a courageous writer. Without daddy’s money to deliver him into high places or the protective cloak of a godfather, Hank forged his way through the world with the […]
Bettie Page : The Notorious Bettie Page
James McConalogue Bettie Page Confidential See all books about Bettie Page at Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.com Directed by Mary Hannon and starring Gretchen Mol [Bettie Page], this film celebrates the equally despised and distinguished iconic heroine, in part responsible for the advent of modern pornography. It is a significant problem when a director attempts to chart […]
Elementarteilchen – the film of Michel Houellebecq’s Atomised :
James McConalogue Atomised – Michel Houellebecq See all books by Michel Houellebecq at Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.com Elementarteilchen DVD This film is terrifyingly humbling, sexually polite and bravely mundane in its philosophical exploration of the fragility pervading human love. It is packed with the warmth of the everyday trials of love and passion. This film, directed […]
Suhayl Saadi : Psychoraag: The Gods Of The Door
Suhayl Saadi on why his writing remains ignored by the British literary establishment Suhayl Saadi Psychoraag – Suhayl Saadi See all books by Suhayl Saadi at Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.com In the context of the publicity surrounding the forthcoming novel, Londonstani, which like my recent novel, Psychoraag (Black and White Publishing, 2004), appears to play with […]
Fritz Lang : Spione
Ismo Santala on the subversive pulp fiction of Lang’s 1928 silent thriller The quick-paced opening sequence of Fritz Lang’s silent thriller Spione (1928) counterpoints a carefully orchestrated crime spree with the gross incompetence of the law. After a series of assassinations and thefts, an agent rushes into the office of a trim government official. Gasping […]
Hunter S. Thompson : An Appreciation : A Real American Patriot
Chris Mitchell on why Hunter S. Thompson was one of the most important figures in American letters I love my friends. Away from email for a few days, log in this morning to 5 different people telling me Hunter S. Thompson is dead. Distraught isn’t the word. Thompson was forever sidelined as a caricature in […]
The Incredibles Are Satan’s FuckBeast
Chris Mitchell on the abomination that is Pixar’s latest The Incredibles. No no no. Sick and wrong. Until now, digital animation had been synonymous not so much with great computer generated cartoons as great scripts – Toy Story, Finding Nemo, Monsters Inc, A Shark’s Tale and, leading them all, Shrek – which not only broke […]
W.G. Sebald: Looking And Looking Away
Stephen Mitchelmore on the novels of W.G. Sebald Why are W.G. Sebald’s novels so flat? Why – when the books refer to events of utmost horror and disaster, sometimes dwelling on pain and death with a fascination and regularity verging on schadenfreude – are the events themselves always placed at a distance, always prior to […]
John Peel : An obituary of sorts : Transmission Ends
What the death of John Peel means for music Mark Richardson Margrave Of The Marshes – John Peel See all books by John Peel at Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.com A week before the death of the Radio One disc jockey John Peel, an interesting exercise in semiotics was broadcast on the news. Fidel Castro, having delivered […]
Poppy Z. Brite : Will Self : Exquisite Corpse : Dorian : Bloodsuckers
Mark Richardson on the gender wars in modern Gothic fiction In recent times it has become commonplace for writers and critics alike to link contemporary gothic narratives with modern day anxieties. Two recent Gothic novels have successfully exposed our cynical attitude towards love relations and our fear of getting too close to the Other: Dorian […]
Nicholas Pileggi and Martin Scorcese : Wiseguy and Goodfellas: Mob Rules
CJ Wood on the transformation of Nicholas Pileggi’s book Wiseguy into Martin Scorcese’s film epic Goodfellas Goodfellas is a film which lives and breathes life, a criminal life set in a world unfolded by convincing narration and a visual style which is perhaps the finest mix yet seen of visceral life and the artist’s eye. […]
Anthony Bourdain: A Cook’s Tour: Eat The World
Jayne Margetts on Anthony Bourdain’s quest to eat the most gastronomically dangerous dishes on the planet I love my authors a tad on the fresh, petulant and carnal side. A splatter of blood-and-guts-style reportage only heightens the pleasure, as do tales of human squalor and degradation. I can hack romance, but only in staccato style, […]
Swans : Swans Are Dead : Swans’ Song
Chris Mitchell on the end of Michael Gira’s intense, undefinable and deafeningly loud musical outfit SWANS The history of music is littered with the debris of those who paid dearly for being different. From the Stooges through to Suicide and the Birthday Party, there are countless individuals and outfits who have, in retrospect, redefined the […]
Chuck Palahniuk : I Want To Have Your Abortion
Jayne Margetts on the writing of Chuck Palahniuk When Bret Easton Ellis unleashed his novel, American Psycho, with its beautiful 18+ logo scripted on a lurid, Picasso-esque cover, my mind went into overdrive. Ellis’ literary missile was unlike anything written before. Its descriptive prose bled psychosis, its painstaking attention to detail as a Guide Book […]
Paul Auster : Cruel Universe
Adrian Gargett on the writing of Paul Auster Paul Auster is not a realist. As the title of his latest book The Book of Illusions suggests, he inhabits a world of illusion. His novels are worldly, finely tuned, elegant and knowingly self-referential. An academic whose wife and two sons die in a plane crash, leaving […]
The Modern Fantasy Diet
Seán Harnett argues that fantasy fiction has become a bloated, pretensious caricature of its own possibilities It’s like looking at Marlon Brando as he is today and remembering what he used to be: he used to be slim, man. He used to be dangerous. He used to mean something. Heroic fantasy used to be slim, […]
Charlotte Carter : Rhode Island Red, Coq Au Vin, Drumsticks : Red Hot And Blue
Chris Wiegand It’s hard not to fall in love with Nanette Hayes, the self-effacing heroine of Rhode Island Red, Coq Au Vin and Drumsticks – a trio of musical mysteries from African-American author Charlotte Carter. A sassy, streetwise, sax-playing busker, Nanette is funky, jazzy and soulful. She’s also no stranger to the Blues. Carter’s novels […]
Maurice Blanchot : The Infinite Conversation : The Absent Voice
Stephen Mitchelmore on the writing of Maurice Blanchot There are many remarkable facts about the long life of the French novelist and philosopher Maurice Blanchot. The strident – perhaps Fascist – nationalism of his pre-War journalism; his near-death at the hands of the Nazis during the war; his reclusive devotion to writing that is similar […]
Thomas Bernhard: The Making Of An Austrian and The Novels of Thomas Bernhard
Stephen Mitchelmore finds Thomas Bernhard to be elusive within two studies of the Austrian writer What if everything we can be depends on playing a role? Where would that leave us? Well, first of all, it would mean that the public self, the one presented to the world, is not “a mask” but the original; […]
Bill Hicks : Bad Moon Rising – a tribute of sorts
Even though he’s been dead for seven years, the savage political satire of Bill Hicks makes more sense than ever. Chris Hall spreads the word. If you mention to any intelligent individual under the age of 25 that you saw Nirvana and The Pixies live you’ll get a response along the lines of “you lucky […]
George Pelecanos: Washington DC Crime Quartet
Chris Wiegand on George Pelecanos’ contemporary hardboiled Washington DC novels With his critically acclaimed Washington DC Quartet, comprising The Big Blowdown, King Suckerman, The Sweet Forever and Shame the Devil, George P. Pelecanos has done for the mean streets of the Chocolate City what Raymond Chandler did for Los Angeles and Chester Himes did for […]
Hunter S. Thompson : Fear and Loathing In America and Screwjack : Postcards From The Edge
Nathan Cain reflects on the journalistic legacy of elderly dope fiend Hunter S. Thompson I found Hunter S. Thompson by accident. I was looking through the stacks at my local public library, searching for something, I don’t remember what, when I read the title Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas on the spine of an […]
Irvine Welsh and the UK Drug Debate
Chris Mitchell ponders the impact of Irvine Welsh’s Trainspotting on the UK drug debate [Spike note – this article was written in December 1997 for the now defunct Canadian online magazine Can Say. With the recent furore in the UK after seven Conservative Shadow Cabinet ministers admitted smoking pot, it seemed worth republishing. Despite there […]
Paul Celan : After The Disaster
Stephen Mitchelmore explores the post-Holocaust poetry of Paul Celan “With a variable key you unlock the house in which drifts the snow of that left unspoken. Always what key you choose depends on the blood that spurts from your eye or your mouth or your ear. You vary the key, you vary the word that […]
