Reviewed by Ben Granger 1. The purpose of politics is to inspire art. The only useful thing it has ever achieved When Marshall Brennan argued “The Manifesto is remarkable for its imaginative power… It is the first great modernist work of art”, he referred specifically to The Communist Manifesto of Marx and Engels. While the […]
Pop Goes Literature: The Decemberists
An authentic literary sensibility in pop music is rare but according to Ben Granger The Decemberists’ Colin Meloy has more than enough to share Pop music and literature are two separate miracles, the silent shout and the screamed secret, two wonders working to their own, different and divided rules. Each has seductive thrills of its […]
Roberto Bolaño: Nazi Literature in the Americas
Published a few years before the works that made him a posthumous literary superstar, Roberto Bolaño’s Nazi Literature in the Americas is an evasive, hybrid beast. Ben Granger gets to grips with it This arcane curiosity of a book – first published in Roberto Bolaño’s native Chile a few years before more his more famous […]
Everything That Follows Is Based On Recent, Real-Life Experience That Has Been Proven To Work – James Shepherd-Baron
“Everything that follows is based on recent, real-life experience that has been proven to work” — James Shepherd-Baron First off — the title. Shepherd-Baron was clearly aiming for the hard-bitten no nonsense “Dettol-does-what-it-says-on—the-tin” approach when naming this comprehensive world survival guide, but has ended up producing the clumsiest and most ungainly titled book of the […]
Mark Fisher – Capitalist Realism
The only game in town, and a rigged one at that. In what is swiftly becoming ‘living memory’, capitalism is now the only economic, social and political system deemed possible, the logic of its late incarnation invading every aspect of life, culture, even inner thought. So absolute is its mental grip that when international finance […]
Wyndham Lewis’ Blast: An Explosive Journal
Ben Granger First published in 1914, Wyndham Lewis’ Blast has just been republished by Thames And Hudson. For centuries, when the Great British reading public scanned the covers of their journals, from Blackwoods through to the Edinburgh Review , the only words they saw were in Roman typeface, crowded and tiny. Imagine their thoughts on […]
Michael Foot: The Uncollected Michael Foot – Essays Old and New
Ben Granger Mention the name Michael Foot and listen out for the automatic sneer. A rolling of eyes at a “disastrous leader”, accompanied no doubt with devilishly cutting asides about donkey jackets, walking sticks or Worzel Gummidge, delete as appropriate. Gerald Kaufman’s deathless Wildeanism chiding Foot’s 1983 Labour Manifesto as “the longest suicide note in […]
Jorge Luis Borges – The Book of Imaginary Beings
Ben Granger Borges is that rare writer, one who can truly change your outlook forever. To read Labyrinths or Ficciones is to experience the universe anew, to find a poetry in mathematics, a mysticism in reason. In tales like “Funes the Memorious”, “The Library of Babel” and “The Garden of Forking Paths”, Borges explores the […]
Joe Dunthorne – Submarine
Ben Granger The “coming-of-age” teenage novel is now a well-weathered archetype, every bit as established in the literary pantheon as the state of the nation diorama, or the star-crossed romantic tragedy. A teenage narrator has the potential to reflect the world in a purer and starker state. At the same time, the self-righteous certainty and […]
Justified Anger: Belinda Webb Interview
“…Tony Blair’s ridiculous lie that we’re all middle-class now – he’s clearly never visited Moss Side. That’s a message I wanted to come over clear…”
Belinda Webb – A Clockwork Apple
Ben Granger As you may guess from the title of this first novel by Belinda Webb, she isn’t shy in acknowledging its chief influence. This iApple/i shares with Burgess’ iOrange/i more than merely its title. Once again we have a teenage gang leader by the name of Alex, indulging in artful thuggery and vicious wordplay […]
The Literary and Political Catholicism of Graham Greene and Evelyn Waugh
“…Whenever there was a chance to have a shot at Catholicism in his writing, George Orwell could always be relied on to take aim and discharge both barrels. With the grim vision of Vatican support for Franco fresh in his mind, he was hardly without justification…”
George Monbiot – The Age of Consent
“…Monbiot, best known to the reading public for his campaigns against global warming, was aiming far beyond “green issues” with this 2003 projected manifesto for the future of the planet. His objective with the book was nothing if not audacious….”
David Baker – It’s Mawdsley
“…The central concept/main gimmick of It’s Mawdsley is essentially how a book would read if written by the kind of person who would never write a book, a stream of consciousness from someone who is barely conscious…”
Sir Oswald Mosley: Blackshirt – Stephen Dorril
“… 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… ”
Pedro Carolino: English As She Is Spoke
“…This whole book is of course, a “mistake”, and a very extreme one too. But every progression of language develops from mishearing, from distortion. While undoubtedly funny, the undulating incongruity of the language is enough to stimulate realms of the mind previously unexplored…” Ben Granger Some of the best-loved writing in the world has been […]
The Fall: Reformation Post TLC
“…very much into the bellowing apparently- random- words- as- associational- poetry mode. “Cheese-sticks!” “Goldfish bowl!” “No Newsnight for you Baby!”…” Ben Granger Reformation Post TLC – The Fall See all books by The Fall at Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.com Chapter 303: In which our hero, the greatest lyrical visionary of the past century to spring from […]
The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil: George Saunders
“…Saunders manages to amuse, entertain, and shake out thought on a great variety of subjects, and does so in a subtle, sideways style which could so easily be annoying but isn’t…” Ben Granger The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil – George Saunders See all books byGeorge Saunders at Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.com Someone once wrote […]
Someone To Drive You Home: The Long Blondes
“…with this far less feted CD, the Long Blondes definitely made the best album of that year, on every level…” Ben Granger Someone To Drive You Home – The Long Blondes See all albums by The Long Blondes at Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.com To be one of the immortals, one of the greats, a band needs […]
The Charlatans : Simpatico
Ben Granger Simpatico – The Charlatans See all albums by The Charlatans at Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.com A childish and vapid point, but some bands make it really easy for childish and vapid reviewers to have a go at them when they first come up with their names. Back in the day there was Dodgy and […]
Alexei Sayle: The Weeping Women Hotel
Ben Granger The Weeping Women Hotel – Alexei Sayle See all books by Alexei Sayle at Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.com It is wise to greet novels by comedians with trepidation. It should go without saying the qualities needed for performing comedy are not necessarily the same ones needed of a novelist, but say it I must, […]
Jack London: The Iron Heel
Ben Granger on Jack London’s neglected dystopian novel that rivals 1984 and Brave New World in its prophetic vision of the future When it comes to accolades for the most lauded prophetic dystopian satirical novels of the early twentieth century, there’s no doubting which are the big two. The hyper-Stalinist all-surveillance paranoid nightmare of Orwell’s […]
Morrissey : Ringleader Of The Tormentors
Ben Granger Ringleader Of The Tormentors – Morrissey See all albums by Morrissey at Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.com Morrissey, for so long adrift in the incongruous lanes of Los Angeles, seems on this album to have finally come alive on the streets of his new home Rome. His art has always laid in the tension of […]
Bret Easton Ellis: Lunar Park
Ben Granger Lunar Park – Bret Easton Ellis See all books by Bret Easton Ellis at Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.com Lunar Park presents itself as the straightforward first-person narrative of “Bret Easton Ellis”, spoiled, self-obsessed, solipsistic rich boy etc. etc. etc. author in a state of debauched twilight. We join up with Bret as he half-heartedly […]
The Fall : Fall Heads Roll
Ben Granger Fall Heads Roll – The Fall See all music by The Fall at Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.com It’s time again for the Seer of Salford to blast forth his enchanted bombast. With more albums now than anyone can count, and with its title surely a sly reference to the number of foot-soldiers fallen from […]
