A weekly podcast on books and culture from the TLS. Editors and writers join Lucy Dallas and Alex Clark to talk through the week’s issue. To read more, welcome to the TLS . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Gardens serve as complex spaces of refuge, cultural expression, and ecological engagement, as explored in Jonathan Bate’s The Garden: Our 4000-Year Quest for Paradise. David E. Cooper highlights how gardens evolve from private sanctuaries to public parks, reflecting shifting human relationships with nature and underlyi...
The TLS Podcast examines the intersection of literature, history, and social dynamics through two distinct discussions. Sophie Oliver explores Rebecca West’s previously unpublished story, "A Fable for Christians," highlighting how early 20th-century feminist and socialist thought grappled with the contradictions of con...
Albert Camus’s notebooks reveal a writer consistently grappling with questions of freedom, authenticity, and the moral responsibilities of the intellectual. These journals, now translated and presented in a comprehensive edition, highlight his internal struggle with class identity and his persistent, often isolating, r...
The Booker Prize shortlist features an unusual concentration of two previous winners, Marlon James and Douglas Stewart, alongside established authors like Elizabeth Strout and M. John Harrison. This selection balances conventional realist narratives with experimental works, such as Luke Kennard’s The Black Bag, which u...
Rose Tremain’s The Housekeeper offers a bold, fictionalized exploration of Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca, shifting the narrative focus to the villainous Mrs. Danvers. By examining the psychological roots of du Maurier’s own self-loathing and gender identity, the novel reimagines the classic gothic tale through a lens of ...
The evolving definition of authorship in the age of artificial intelligence and the fundamental role of symbiosis in the natural world define this discussion. Anchit Sathi examines how AI-assisted writing challenges traditional concepts of the "lone genius" author, suggesting that institutional mechanisms must replace ...
The Booker Prize judging process demands immense rigor, requiring judges to navigate 163 submissions over six months while maintaining equity and fairness. Chair Mary Beard highlights the logistical challenges of managing these volumes, the necessity of strategic reading, and the psychological weight of selecting the b...
The necessity of rest and the value of reading serve as the central pillars of this discussion. Overwork and constant digital stimulation negatively impact brain chemistry, necessitating periods of intentional idleness to activate the brain's "default network" for recuperation and creativity. Rather than viewing rest a...
Games serve as a "flight simulator for agency," allowing individuals to voluntarily adopt temporary, disposable goals that provide clarity and structure often absent in the complexities of real life. While games foster social bonding and self-discovery, they contrast sharply with metrics, which quantify performance in ...
The latest issue of The TLS features a diverse array of fiction, including Amit Chaudhury’s Chateau Rouge, Donal Ryan’s Where the Kings, and a collection of art-focused novels exploring subjects from Goya’s protégé to Victorian asylum life. A central focus is Christopher Nolan’s cinematic adaptation of The Odyssey, whi...
The TLS Podcast highlights diverse literary and artistic explorations, ranging from the creative transition between poetry and memoir to the complexities of staging Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia. Writers and directors examine the necessity of deep research in memoir writing, noting how prose requires more structural informati...
The Booker Prize longlist and the intersection of artistic life with cinematic representation drive this discussion. Geoff Dyer, recipient of the TLS Ackerley Prize, examines how childhood memories—often triggered by mundane sensory details like the smell of dog food—shape personal identity and writing. The tension bet...
Emily Brontë’s life and creative process, often obscured by the mythos of Wuthering Heights, emerge through the material record of her surviving personal effects and poetry. Deborah Lutz’s This Dark Night highlights how Brontë maintained a fiercely guarded, self-possessed inner life within the cramped, domestic environ...
The TLS Podcast explores the intersection of intellectual inquiry and human emotion through literature and theater. Director Carrie Cracknell discusses the challenges of staging Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia, emphasizing that actors must embody complex scientific and philosophical concepts to ground the play’s abstract themes...
The TLS Podcast examines the intersection of literary legacy and the practical realities of creative labor. Scarlett Baron analyzes Anthony Burgess’s previously unknown, drastic abbreviation of James Joyce’s Ulysses, questioning the rationale behind such a radical editorial intervention. The discussion highlights the t...
Summer reading selections from TLS contributors highlight a diverse range of fiction and non-fiction, reflecting both personal interests and broader literary trends. Discussions center on the challenges of balancing holiday leisure with intellectually demanding texts, such as the time-slip novels of Solvay Ballet or th...
Nigel Planer reflects on his multifaceted career as an actor, comedian, and author, centered around the release of his memoir, Young Once. Throughout his life, a compulsion to adopt personas served as a defense mechanism against personal scrutiny, a pattern that evolved from his early days as a performance poet to his ...
Colm Tóibín’s latest short story collection, The News from Dublin, explores the complexities of exile, silence, and moral imagination through narratives set across Ireland, Spain, and the United States. Tóibín details his meticulous writing process, emphasizing the importance of establishing an opening rhythm and the c...
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