Freedom, Books, Flowers & The Moon

The TLS’s philosophy editor Tim Crane guides us through a selection of reviews and essays from this week’s issue, including on the future of AI and what Thomas Hobbes, Susan Sontag, Montaigne and the trolley problem can tell us about our present predicament; the novelist Will Eaves re-reads Daniel Defoe’s A Journal of the Plague Year, “a caravan of episodes, made up of people going through the same horror in different ways”, and ponders a big-screen adaptation…   See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Ian Buruma on the twentieth-century Italian writer Curzio Malaparte, a fascist and a fabulist with a hunger for war and a remarkable way of capturing it; Sue Stuart-Smith on gardening in the trenches of the First World War and the concept of horticultural therapy; to mark the 75th anniversary of VE Day, the TLS's history editor David Horspool talks us through a range of books, articles and essays covering the Second World WarSelected booksDiary of a Foreigner in Paris, by Curzio Malaparte, translated from the Italian and the French by Stephen TwilleyThe Well-Gardened Mind: The restorative power of nature, by Sue Stuart-SmithDresden: The fire and the darkness, by Sinclair McKayThe Volunteer: The true story of the resistance hero who infiltrated Auschwitz, by Jack Fairweather  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

James Waddell on the disorderly history of alphabetic order; Beejay Silcox, who fled Cairo for Western Australia as the coronavirus spread, tells a tale of star-crossed lovers; Jordan Sand gives a short cultural history of mask-wearingA Place for Everything: The curious history of alphabetical order by Judith Flanders  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Lawrence Douglas, in Massachusetts, on the presidential past, present and future of Donald Trump; Irina Dumitrescu, in Germany, on books as escape (attempt) and reading the plague into plague-free books; Lucy Dallas presents this month’s round-up of audio / visual offerings A Very Stable Genius: Donald Trump’s testing of America, by Philip Rucker and Carol LeonnigUnmaking The Presidency: Donald Trump’s war on the world’s most powerful office, by Susan Hennessey and Benjamin WittesAmerican Carnage: On the front lines of the Republican civil war and the rise of President Trump, by Tim Alberta  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

William Shakespeare, the writer who – above all others, perhaps – keeps giving and giving. Michael Caines takes us through the latest research, theories and discoveries (or not, as the case may be); Why do women read more fiction than men? Lucy Scholes returns to the age-old conundrumDeath by Shakespeare: Snakebites, stabbings and broken hearts by Kathryn HarkupUntimely Death in Renaissance Drama by Andrew GriffinShakespeare in a Divided America by James ShapiroShakespeare and Trump by Jeffrey R. Wilson‘Infecting the teller – The failure of a mathematical approach to Shakespeare’s authorship’ by Brian Vickers, in this week’s TLSWhy Women Read Fiction: The stories of our lives by Helen Taylor  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Today an edition of our new daily podcast - Stories of our times. Our new free daily news podcast takes you to the heart of the stories that matter, with exclusive access and reporting. Published for the start of your day, it is hosted by Manveen Rana and David Aaronovitch.If you want to hear more please search for Stories of our times and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.With reading on the rise under the lockdown, TLS editor Stig Abell suggests three books for a little escapism during these uncertain times. Stories of our times is the new daily podcast from The Times. Listen to more episodes here  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Ellen Crowell investigates an early-twentieth-century tale of doomed lesbian romance, decadent cryptography, morphine-induced suicide and more; Richard Smyth on the joys of bird-watching during lockdown; Michael Caines reads his poem “Decadence”  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

A recovering Alexander van Tulleken shares some thoughts on the British response to Covid-19; What cultural things are people doing to pass the time in isolation? We asked a selection of our writers, and Lucy Dallas joins us (from what sounds like a small tin box) to pluck at the results  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Samuel Graydon reviews two new albums, by the folk troubadour Sam Lee and indie rock band Cornershop, both of which offer innovative and intelligent musical perspectives on modern England; the TLS’s arts editor Lucy Dallas presents this month’s ‘Audio/Visual’, a monthly round-up of listening and watching; Josephine Livingstone grapples with the 'omnivore paradox' in the arts sector: why broader tastes in art have not led to wider participationFeatured works Old Wow by Sam LeeEngland is a Garden by CornershopAudio: ‘Reply All’, the podcastVisual: ‘Five Guys a Week’, Channel 4Entitled: Discriminating tastes and the expansion of the arts by Jennifer C. LenaSteal as Much as You Can: How to win the culture wars in an age of austerity by Nathalie OlahSmashing It: Working class artists on life, art and making it happen, edited by Sabrina Mahfouz  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Tim Parks talks us through the lockdown from Milan; A. N. Wilson explains the Prayer Book Controversy of the 1920s, and why it's a bit like Brexit; and Anna Girling looks back on the - failed - poetic and critical career of Richard AldingtonRichard Aldington, Two volumes, by Vivien Whelpton  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Frances Wilson gets implausibly angry about the hypocrisy of Patrick O’Brian; Michèle Roberts makes the case for the forgotten author of the nineteenth century, George Sand; Miranda Seymour turns literary detective to identify a new work by Ada Lovelace. And Roz Dineen fails to be enticed by cakes.Romans 1 & 2 George Sand; Edited by José-Luis Diaz and Brigitte DiazPatrick O’Brian – A very private life Nikolai Tolstoy  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Edmund Gordon discusses whether Hilary Mantel's final Cromwell novel lives up to its billing - and whether, at 900-odd pages, it is the right length; Muriel Zagha looks at the female gaze in French cinema, with respect to the new film Portrait of a Lady on Fire; Irina Dumitrescu talks about how to write well, and when to break the rulesThe Mirror & the Light, by Hilary MantelPortrait of a Lady on Fire, by Céline SciammaWhy They Can't Write, by John WarnerWriting to Persuade, by Trish HallEvery Day I Write the Book, by Amitava Kumar  First You Write a Sentence, by Joe MoranMeander, Spiral, Explode, by Jane Alison  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week the TLS is running an extract from The Mirror & the Light, the long-awaited third and final volume of Hilary Mantel’s Thomas Cromwell novels. In 1538 Thomas Cromwell, Lord Privy Seal, questions Geoffrey Pole, the youngest son of a great family. Pole is accused of conspiring against Henry VIII and attempting to bring back the old religion and reinstate the Pope as head of the Church. (The Mirror & the Light will be published on March 5 by Fourth Estate. The audio book is published by W F Howes and narrated by Ben Miles.)  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

James Shapiro, the author of Shakespeare in a Divided America, discusses the history of West Side Story, the most popular and successful Shakespeare musical of all time, and Ivo van Hove's flawed Broadway adaptation; Toby Lichtig reviews Tom Stoppard's new play Leopoldstadt and talks us through a selection of Jewish-focused pieces in this week's issue of the TLS; David Horspool, the TLS's history editor and a keen consumer of audiobooks, tells us what he has been listening to this monthWest Side Story, directed by Ivo van HoveLeopoldstadt by Tom Stoppard, Wyndham's Theatre, London, until June 13  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Rebecca Langlands on lessons learnt in the only known ancient Roman brothel; Caroline Moorehead reviews Elena Ferrante's latest novel; Rory Waterman reads a new poem, "Defences" ("'Crikey!' you say. 'It’s gorgeous!'...")Books: The Brothel of Pompeii: Sex, class, and gender at the margins of Roman society, by Sarah Levin-Richardson La vita bugiarda degli adulti, by Elena Ferrante  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

The Irish novelist reads an extract from her new novel, published in this week's TLS, in print, app and online   See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Is it the best of times or the worst of times to be a satirist? Madeleine Brettingham, a writer on the BBC's News Quiz, joins us to discuss; Toby Lichtig on a new production of Endgame and the constraints imposed on Samuel Beckett adaptations; founded in the 1960s, the Oulipo was – and remains – a group of writers and scientists striving for "potential literature". Anna Aslanyan considers the movement's legacyMarch of the Lemmings: Brexit in print and performance 2016–2019, by Stewart LeeThe Joke is On Us: Political comedy in (late) neoliberal times, edited by Julie A. WebberEndgame / Rough For Theatre II, at the Old Vic theatre, LondonThe Oulipo and Modern Thought, by Dennis DuncanAll that is Evident is Suspect: Readings from the Oulipo 1963–2018, edited and translated by Daniel Levin Becker and Ian Monk  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

One of Germany's most acclaimed novelists talks to Maren Meinhardt about his new novel, Tyll, a vivid account of a seventeenth-century trickster's journey through a Europe ravaged by the Thirty Years’ War.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Caryl Emerson on Tolstoy’s art, ideas and life, and the extent to which these came together; Benjamin Markovits returns to a treasured childhood book: The Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Player's Handbook; Eve Babitz – a “fizzy”, “fabulous” chronicler of 1960s and 70s Los Angeles – is mid revival. Megan Marz fills us in.Lives and Deaths: Essential stories by Leo Tolstoy, translated by Boris DralyukLeo Tolstoy: A very short introduction by Liza KnappLeo Tolstoy by Andrei ZorinThe Advanced Dungeons and Dragons Players Handbook by Gary GygaxI Used To Be Charming: The rest of Eve Babitz, edited by Sara J. KramerHollywood’s Eve: Eve Babitz and the secret history of L.A., by Lili Anolik  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Lucy Dallas reports on theories, developments and disputes in the world of science fiction; Lawrence Douglas adds crucial historical context – stretching back to the Middle Ages, in fact – to the current US presidential impeachment; the poet Hannah Sullivan emerges from Princeton University Library with fresh insight into T. S. Eliot's love letters   The Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction by Ursula Le GuinThe Expanse, Volumes 1–8, by James S. A. Corey  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.