Showing results for "gordon griffin" in Art & Literature

Roger Deakin, author of the immortal Waterlog and Wildwood, was a man of unusually many parts. A born writer who nonetheless took decades to write his first book, Roger was also variously—and sometimes simultaneously—maverick ad-man, seller of stripped pine furniture on the Portobello Road, cider-maker, teacher, environmentalist, music promoter, and filmmaker. But above all he was the restorer of ancient Walnut Tree Farm in Suffolk.

Drawing on extensive archival sources and hundreds of interviews, Timothy Brennan’s Places of Mind is the first comprehensive biography of Said, one of the most controversial and celebrated intellectuals of the 20th century. In Brennan’s masterful work, Said, the pioneer of post-colonial studies, a tireless champion for his native Palestine and an erudite literary critic, emerges as a self-doubting, tender and eloquent advocate of literature’s dramatic effects on politics and civic life.

The English novelist Patrick O’Brian is much admired for his best-selling Aubrey-Maturin series of sea novels - the unexpected success of the series secured his place in literary history. Far less is known about O’Brian’s personal life, largely because he preferred to keep it that way. In A Very Private Life, O’Brian’s stepson Nikolai Tolstoy draws upon his stepfather’s archives and papers to faithfully capture a life dedicated to the written word.