If you had been in the vicinity of the Turk’s Head Tavern on Soho’s Gerrard Street on a Friday evening in the second half of the 18th century, you might have recognised a number of famous men ...

Denis Diderot, at Catherine the Great’s insistent invitation, spent the autumn and winter of 1773–4 in St Petersburg. It was the worst time of year for an ageing philosopher, underdressed, plagued by ...

In researching material for my book on the Waughs, Fathers and Sons, I came across the obscure name of S P B Mais many times, for over a long lifespan S P B had, at various junctures, earned his keep ...

In the long history of Western culture, it is given to very few to have an entire era named after them. Socrates sits within Antiquity, Leonardo da Vinci within the Renaissance; even Shakespeare has ...

On Wednesday 28 January 1756, the Jamaican planter Thomas Thistlewood made a brief entry in his journal: ‘Had Derby well whipped, and made Egypt shit in his face.’ The punishment was not a one-off; ...

MAPS ARE MUCH too important to be left to geographers and travellers. For centuries they were left to them, and treasures of incalculable value were lost as a result. We have stories of the great ...

In his long and distinguished career as a novelist Graham Greene has often flirted with the simple adventure story (‘There is a great deal of Boys’ Own Paper in Greene,’ V S Pritchett once told me).

HE WAS AN odd fellow, J L Carr. I first met hm in 1988 at a writers’ conference at York University. Despite the fact that he was a celebrated novelist who had been twice shortlisted for the Booker ...

‘Alas, the love of women!’ moaned Byron in Don Juan. But the love of women was as naught compared to the pursuit of Byron by his legion of biographers, who return to his carcass with the regularity of ...

AS ALL HIS biographers have discovered to their cost, a life of Browning is inevitably a life of his wife. Although the poet was married late and widowed early, his years with Elizabeth Barrett left ...

Another great cover by @chrisriddell50 announces the latest @Lit_Review incl my piece on a gripping account of a true crime story by James Lasdun Roy Cohn prosecuted the Rosenbergs, served as Joseph ...

The English love to hate Wallis Simpson. She is vilified as the gold-digging sex goddess who stole our film-star king, Edward VIII. Hugo Vickers has spent a lifetime following Wallis. At the age of ...