Literature

The Invention of Scotland: Myth and History by Hugh Trevor-Roper

Human Love by Andreï Makine

Far from sending out subliminal religious messages, The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian is an uncomplicated adaptation of a children’s classic

Each new translation of Islam’s most sacred text offers fresh insights into its meaning. Yet there are still surprises in a book that is not only hard to read, but hard to know how to read, even for Muslims

The word “bestseller” is a terminological outrage

Wolf Totem is a disconcerting mixture of nationalism, lupine metaphors and nostalgia for the age of nomads. But what does the novel’s runaway success tell us of the aspirations of the new China?

Despite the name, television drama The Sopranos has nothing to do with opera – or does it?

History Lesson: A Race Odyssey by Mary Lefkowitz

‘Without Gore Vidal we would never have known that Nancy Reagan was a full colonel in the KGB’

‘Seventies London was a great place to grow up. As the son of refugees, I say to the English: so long, and thanks for the language’