Literary Criticism

The tale of a tormented creature created in a laboratory began on a rainy night in 1816 in the imagination of a nineteen-year-old Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, newly married to the...

In The Critic as Artist, arguably the most complete exploration of his aesthetic thinking, and certainly the most entertaining, Oscar Wilde harnesses his famous wit to demolish the supposed boundary...

How do we talk about porn? Why it is that when we do talk about porn, we tend to retreat into the abstract? How do we have meaningful conversations about...

Spark creativity with 892 Opening Lines, an inspirational collection of fictional opening sentences.892 Opening Lines is an astoundingly varied collection of fictional first sentences that will spark a writer's creativity....

THE CONTROVERSIAL SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER. Candid, fearless and provocative - the author of American Psycho on who he is and what he thinks is wrong with the world today. Bret...

THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERA GUARDIAN, INDEPENDENT, IRISH TIMES AND EVENING STANDARD BOOK OF 2021'A masterclass from a warm and engagingly enthusiastic companion' Guardian Summer Reading Picks 2021'This book is...

'A tonic for the soul ... I was so absorbed by her writing it was unreal' Emilia Clarke'Nothing about Jenny Diski is conventional. Diski does not do linear, or normal,...

Shortlisted for the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the EssayNamed a Best Book of 2018 by TIME, Washington Post, Entertainment Weekly, Wired, Esquire, Buzzfeed, Paste, Bitch, Bustle, The Chicago...

SHORTLISTED FOR THE RATHBONES FOLIO PRIZE 2019'Beautiful, unusual and memorable ... I love this book' MAGGIE NELSON, author of THE ARGONAUTSIn Can You Tolerate This? - the title comes from...

From the private papers of Mark Twain and Mozart to those of Robert Browning and Nelson, Love Letters of Great Men collects together some of the most romantic letters in...

Acerbic, wisecracking and hilarious, this is the definitive essay collection from New York legend and satirist, Fran Lebowitz, star of Martin Scorsese's hit Netflix series, Pretend It's a City.'The gold...

The author of the widely praised Wordslut analyzes the social science of cult influence: how cultish groups from Jonestown and Scientology to SoulCycle and social media gurus use language as...

'Simply one of our most exciting writers' - Observer'A free-wheeling and joyful exploration of the works and lives of a range of artists and thinkers who brought libidinal and creative...

Don DeLillo, American Original is a startlingly original and provocative reinterpretation of one of the most important novelists of the 20th and 21st centuries. Adopting a direct approach that steers...

Object Lessons is a series of short, beautifully designed books about the hidden lives of ordinary things. Exits are all around us. They are the difference between travelling and arriving,...

Interviews from the Edge presents a selection of conversations, drawn from 50 years of the international journal New Orleans Review, that dive head-first into the most enduring aesthetic and social...

Svetlana Boym was a prolific writer, a charismatic professor, a novelist, and a public intellectual. She was also a fiercely resourceful and reflective immigrant; her most resonant book, The Future...

Revisioning Beckett reassesses Beckett's career and literary output, particularly his engagement with what might be called decadent modernism. Gontarski approaches Beckett from multiple viewpoints: from his running afoul of the...

Object Lessons is a series of short, beautifully designed books about the hidden lives of ordinary things. This book is about a strange object-strange in part because it is something...

Object Lessons is a series of short, beautifully designed books about the hidden lives of ordinary things. Questionnaires are everywhere: we fill them out at doctors' offices and at job...

"Who better to raise teens' awareness of mental illness and health than the YA authors they admire?" -Booklist (starred review) "[A] much-needed, enlightening book." -School Library Journal (starred review) Your...

The publishing house of John Murray was founded in Fleet Street in 1768 and remained a family firm over seven generations. Published to coincide with this 'remarkable achievement' and in...

On the eve of the bicentenary of Jane Austen's death, step back into the world in which our best-loved novelist lived. Historian Lucy Worsley visits Jane Austen's childhood home, her...

This remarkable and monumental book at last provides a comprehensive answer to the age-old riddle of whether there are only a small number of 'basic stories' in the world. Using...

The W&A Guide to Writing for Children and YA provides informed, practical advice from a successful and experienced writer of children's books across all ages. Its coverage includes picture books...

The W&A Guide to Getting Published provides the would-be published author with expert knowledge on securing a book deal - from preparing a manuscript for submission, to finding an agent,...

Packed with practical advice, guidance and inspiration about all aspects of the writing process, this Yearbook is the essential resource on how to get published.It will guide authors and illustrators...

'Wordy is about the intoxication of writing; my sense of playful versatility; different voices for different matters: the polemical voice for political columns; the sharp-eyed descriptive take for profiles; poetic...

*BBC Radio 4 Book of the Week* Benjamin Zephaniah, who has travelled the world for his art and his humanitarianism, now tells the one story that encompasses it all: the...

What are our favourite authors' words? Which bestselling writer uses the most cliches? How can we judge a book by its cover? Data meets literature in this playful and informative...

The quirky inspiration of the 642 series takes flight in this collection of fiction-writing prompts that will make anyone want to grab a pen and write what happens next.

The literary arts represent and provoke experiences of understanding and emotion, and this open access study examines how the practical pursuit of well-being in healthcare reveals purposes at the core...

Beneath the surface we are all connected . . .'An authentically soothing, powerful, thought-provoker.'MATT HAIG'On Connection is medicine for these wounded times.'MAX PORTER'On Connection came to me when I needed...

'This is a brilliant book about the birth of modernism, one that taught me something on every page ... You will feel - and be! - much smarter after you...

'A fascinating mix of literary criticism, cultural history and memoir ... Highly enjoyable' Sunday TimesHow might we live more freely, and will we be happier or lonelier if we do?...

Ever since the term "creative nonfiction" first came into widespread use, memoirists and journalists, essayists and fiction writers have faced off over where the border between fact and fiction lies....

As the most popular and fastest growing form of media today, the podcast is a vital tool for creative writing courses in their bid to become more dynamic, interactive, inclusive,...