London Review Bookshop Podcasts

Iain Sinclair has been writing about London for most of his adult life, and if any of us can even begin to understand this peculiar sort of city that we sort of call a sort of home, then it's with Sinclair that we begin. The Last London (Oneworld) is the culmination of Iain's London project, although 'project' is far too determined a word to describe a body of work so many-layered, so prodigiously polyvalent. At our event at St. George's, Bloomsbury, he talked about the book and the city with comedian, writer and film director Stewart Lee, another Londoner from elsewhere.

Iain Sinclair has been writing about London for most of his adult life, and if any of us can even begin to understand this peculiar sort of city that we sort of call a sort of home, then it's with Sinclair that we begin. The Last London (Oneworld) is the culmination of Iain's London project, although 'project' is far too determined a word to describe a body of work so many-layered, so prodigiously polyvalent. At our event at St. George's, Bloomsbury, he talked about the book and the city with comedian, writer and film director Stewart Lee, another Londoner from elsewhere.

Twenty years after Kathy Acker's untimely death, Chris Kraus has provided the first full biography of the avant-garde artist, writer and counter-cultural heroine. Sheila Heti writes of After Kathy Acker (Allen Lane) 'This is a gossipy, anti-mythic artist biography which feels like it's being told in one long rush of a monologue over late-night drinks by someone who was there.' On the 25th September, Chris Kraus, the author of amongst many other books I Love Dick ('the most important book about men and women written in the last century.' according to Emily Gould in the Guardian) was joined in conversation about Acker by writer Juliet Jacques, the author of Trans: A Memoir (Verso).

A very special evening at the Bookshop poet, playwright and translator Anne Carson. With Robert Currie and Ben Whishaw, Anne performed Lecture On The History Of Skywriting, a piece originally commissioned by Laurie Anderson for New York Live Ideas.

A very special evening at the Bookshop poet, playwright and translator Anne Carson. With Robert Currie and Ben Whishaw, Anne performed Lecture On The History Of Skywriting, a piece originally commissioned by Laurie Anderson for New York Live Ideas.

Four of the most interesting poets working today read at the bookshop, to mark the publication of Cambridge Literary Review 10: Vahni Capildeo, Drew Milne, Luke Roberts and Eley Williams.

'Americans don’t actually believe in death.' Siri Hustvedt and Lisa Appignanesi were in conversation in the bookshop. Hustvedt's latest collection of essays on art, sex and psychology, A Woman Looking at Men Looking at Women, is published by Sceptre; Prospect magazine, reviewing the volume, called her 'a writer of blazing intelligence and curiosity'. Lisa Appignanesi's Trials of Passion: Crimes in the Name of Love and Madness was published in 2014.

Horacio Castellanos Moya was in conversation at the Bookshop with Rory O'Bryen. Best known in the UK for novels such as Revulsion: Thomas Bernhard in San Salvador and The Dream of My Return, Castellanos Moya is a writer who, in the words of Natasha Wimmer, 'has turned anxiety into an art-form and an act of rebellion, and redeemed paranoia as a positive indicator of rot'. This event took place in association with Cervantes Institute London and the Embassy of El Salvador.

Anna Minton, Reader in Architecture at the University of East London and author of Ground Control, asks, in her latest book Big Capital (Penguin), a very big question: 'Who is London For?' As the cost of housing spirals upwards, putting this most essential of all necessities beyond the financial reach of the majority of Londoners, Minton draws on original research to bring us the stories of those in the frontline of the struggle to keep a roof over their heads, to analyse how we got into this mess, and to suggest some practical policies for how we might start to get out of it. Anna was in conversation with Oliver Wainwright, the architecture and design critic for the Guardian.

Philip Hoare, who won the Samuel Johnson Prize in 2009 for his magnificent Leviathan, continues his exploration of our watery world with RISINGTIDEFALLINGSTAR (Fourth Estate). In searching the past and present for stories encapsulating the human fascination with the sea, Hoare mixes natural history with travel writing, autobiography and literary criticism to create an invigorating portrait of the oceans, and of their often fatal allure. He was in conversation with Olivia Laing, author of The Lonely City, The Trip to Echo Spring and To the River.

Philip Hoare, who won the Samuel Johnson Prize in 2009 for his magnificent Leviathan, continues his exploration of our watery world with RISINGTIDEFALLINGSTAR (Fourth Estate). In searching the past and present for stories encapsulating the human fascination with the sea, Hoare mixes natural history with travel writing, autobiography and literary criticism to create an invigorating portrait of the oceans, and of their often fatal allure. He was in conversation with Olivia Laing, author of The Lonely City, The Trip to Echo Spring and To the River.

PalFest, The Palestinian Festival of Literature, which brings writers from around the world to Palestine to read to and meet their readers, celebrates its tenth anniversary this year. This Is Not a Border is an anthology of essays, poems and stories from some of those writers and artists as they respond to their experiences at this unique festival. Heartbreaking and hopeful, their gathered work is a testament to the power of literature to promote solidarity and courage in the most desperate of situations. To celebrate the launch of this remarkable anthology, we were joined for an evening of readings and discussion by its editor Ahdaf Soueif, contributors Jeremy Harding and Rachel Holmes, and Bashir Abu-Manneh, lecturer in postcolonial literature at the University of Kent.

PalFest, The Palestinian Festival of Literature, which brings writers from around the world to Palestine to read to and meet their readers, celebrates its tenth anniversary this year. This Is Not a Border is an anthology of essays, poems and stories from some of those writers and artists as they respond to their experiences at this unique festival. Heartbreaking and hopeful, their gathered work is a testament to the power of literature to promote solidarity and courage in the most desperate of situations. To celebrate the launch of this remarkable anthology, we were joined for an evening of readings and discussion by its editor Ahdaf Soueif, contributors Jeremy Harding and Rachel Holmes, and Bashir Abu-Manneh, lecturer in postcolonial literature at the University of Kent.

Andrew O’Hagan’s latest book The Secret Life brings together three of his finest long essays, each of them investigating the strange, vexed intersections and conflicts between the virtual and the real, and what they mean for the nature and construction of identity in the modern world. ‘Ghosting’ tells the story of O’Hagan’s difficult collaboration with Wikileaks founder Julian Assange; in ‘The Invention of Ronald Pinn’ he uses the real identity of a deceased young man to create an entirely spurious one that exists only in cyberspace, and ‘The Satoshi Affair’ explores the strange history of Craig Wright, the man who may or may not be the inventor of Bitcoin. As well as being ‘The best essayist of his generation’ (New York Times), O’Hagan is an acclaimed novelist and contributing editor at the LRB. He was in conversation about his latest work with Hans-Ulrich Obrist, curator of the Serpentine Gallery and author of Ways of Curating.

Ali Smith was at the shop to read from and talk about her (now Booker nominated!) novel Autumn, an unconventional love story that plays with boundaries of time and space and is the first in a quartet of seasons. Smith won the Bailey’s Prize for Fiction in 2015 for How to Be Both and has been short-listed for the Man Booker prize on several occasions. Smith was in conversation with The Guardian journalist Alex Clark.