Literature: history and criticism

Shakespeare in Swahililand: Adventures with the Ever-Living Poet

Investigating the literary culture of the early interaction between European countries and East Africa, Edward Wilson-Lee uncovers an extraordinary sequence of stories in which explorers, railway labourers, decadent émigrés, freedom fighters, and pioneering African leaders made Shakespeare their own in this alien land.

George MacDonald

An 365-day anthology of readings from one of the most influential writers of all time, George MacDonald, compiled by CS Lewis himself.

A House in St John’s Wood: In Search of My Parents

An intimate portrait of Stephen Spender’s extraordinary life written by Matthew Spender, shifting between memoir and biography, with new insights drawn from personal recollections and his father’s copious unpublished archives.

Shakespeare’s Little Book of Wisdom

Shakespeare’s Little Book of Wisdom offers more than 300 bite-size nuggets of inspiration and wisdom from the greatest writer in the English language and the most popular playwright across the globe.

Ted Hughes: The Unauthorised Life

SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2015 SAMUEL JOHNSON PRIZE

‘Gripping and at times ineffably sad, this book would be poetic even without the poetry. It will be the standard biography of Ted Hughes for a long time to come’ Sunday Times

‘Seldom has the life of a writer rattled along with such furious activity … A moving, fascinating biography’ The Times

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