Paul Elie
Paul Elie’s first book, The Life You Save May Be Your Own, was a National Book Critics Circle award finalist. It has just been published in paperback.
Giacometti by James Lord (Farrar, Straus, & Giroux, $25). Lord, who knew Alberto Giacometti well, seems to have acquired the great sculptor’s sense of the power and mystery of the human figure seen in the round. In Lord’s sentences, which have the grace of Flaubert’s, Giacometti stands before the reader as a physical, indeed a sculptural, presence.
Dr. Johnson and Mr. Savage by Richard Holmes (Vintage, $13). The biographer of Shelley and Coleridge here puts himself forward as the anti-Boswell. Whereas Boswell’s Life of Johnson is the most complete of biographies, this book takes a single early friendship of Johnson’s—with the doomed poet Richard Savage—and through it refracts Johnson’s life story. In so doing, Holmes offers an ars poetica for the art of biography.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Edmund Campion by Evelyn Waugh (out of print). The devotional work as an act of the historical imagination. In this short biography of the martyred recusant English Jesuit, Waugh vividly evokes the Catholic England vanquished by Henry VIII and his successors, and so puts forward his own ideal of the Catholic faith: learned, steadfast, heroic, stylish.
Erasmus by Johan Huizinga (out of print). Though the Dutch historian Huizinga is expert in Erasmus of Rotterdam’s many works, this is not a literary biography or a life of ideas but a work of biographical portraiture—an image of the man as might have been fashioned by a Dutch master.
God: A Biography
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Create an account with the same email registered to your subscription to unlock access.
-
Smoking ban: the return of the nanny state?
Talking Point Starmer's plan to revive Sunak-era war on tobacco has struck an unsettling chord even with some non-smokers
By The Week UK Published
-
Crossword: September 7, 2024
The Week's daily crossword puzzle
By The Week Staff Published
-
Sudoku hard: September 7, 2024
The Week's daily hard sudoku puzzle
By The Week Staff Published
-
Peter Godfrey-Smith's 6 favorite books for expanding your mind
Feature The philosopher recommends works by Annie Proulx, Douglas Hofstadter, and more
By The Week US Published
-
Chelsea Bieker's 6 favorite books dramatizing domestic violence's impact
Feature The novelist recommends works by Anna Quindlen, Anita Shreve, and more
By The Week US Published
-
Helen Phillips' 6 favorite books about robotic companions
Feature The novelist recommends works by Kazuo Ishiguro, Jessamine Chan, and more
By The Week US Published
-
Todd May's 6 favorite books that offer philosophical insight
Feature The philosopher recommends works by Virginia Woolf, William Shakespeare, and more
By The Week US Published
-
Lev Grossman's 6 favorite books that explore the Middle Ages
Feature The author recommends works by Dan Jones, T.H. White, and more
By The Week US Published
-
Amy Stewart's 6 favorite books for plant enthusiasts
Feature The best-selling author recommends works by Naoko Abe, Ann Patchett, and more
By The Week US Published
-
Peng Shepherd's 6 favorite works with themes of magical realism
Feature The author recommends works by Susanna Clarke, George Saunders, and more
By The Week US Published
-
Laura van den Berg's 6 favorite books with hidden secrets
Feature The author recommends works by Patricia Lockwood, Gillian Flynn, and more
By The Week US Published