The Man Booker International Prize 2018 longlist is here. Since 2016, this prize is awarded annually to a single work translated into English. This year's judges include Lisa Appignanesi (Chair), Michael Hoffmann, Hari Kunzru, Tim Martin and Helen Oyeyemi. Last year's winner was A Horse Walks Into A Bar by David Grossman (Israel). Chosen from […]
On March 4, the 90th Academy Awards ceremony takes place – where glamour and gowns share the spotlight (very uneasily) with the political issues of the day. This year will be no different. Challenges to the systemic under-representation of disenfranchised people will continue to grow – the joy and affirmation associated with the release of […]
The Swedish art of döstädning, or 'death cleaning', is the latest trend in keeping less than the Joneses. Deal with your belongings before you die – so your family (or a cleaning company) doesn't have to. In her slim book, The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning, Margareta Magnusson asks you to think beyond heirlooms. Examine everything in your home, […]
The longlist for the Man Booker Prize for Fiction 2017 has been announced. Thirteen titles from 144 entries published in the United Kingdom in English between October 2016 and September 2017 have been selected. The 2017 judges are Baroness Lola Young (Chair), literary critic Lila Azam Zanganeh, novelist Sarah Hall, artist Tom Phillips and travel writer Colin […]
"Wait – what? No!!" said my middle-schooler, staring at his phone with dismay. George Romero had died at the age of 77, leaving legions of fans mourning across social media. As the undisputed King of the Zombie Film, Romero wrote the playbook on the modern zombie. From World War Z to The Walking Dead, […]
"Grip-Lit" is certainly the fiction of choice for 2016 (as if this year wasn't tense enough). Psychological thrillers aren't new. However, these popular women-in-peril novels focus on domestic horrors: abuse, accidents, memory loss, missing children and (really) bad romance. Mix in unreliable narrators and huuge surprises — and you have a gripping read. And isn't […]
(photo: Rowland Scherman on assignment from The US Information Agency, 1963) The legendary Bob Dylan is the winner of the 2016 Nobel Prize for Literature "for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition." Dylan is the first musician to win this illustrious prize — and it came as a surprise to […]
Graphic: Wikipedia Creative Commons, logo designed by Baron Pierre de Coubertin, 1912 If controversy was an Olympic event, the Olympic Games would certainly place. Boycotts, cheating, corruption, discrimination, doping, human rights violations, terrorism, and violence have taken a place on the podium for decades. Nevertheless, millions will be watching as the Olympic torch is lit on […]
[Photo: Ring Magazine, Getty Images] Muhammad Ali, considered to be the best boxer of all time, died on June 3 at the age of 74. Ali was a seismic force both inside and outside the ring — outspoken, principled and fearless — his fight for racial equality and his adamant refusal to fight in Vietnam […]
[photograph by Charlie Gray, Shortlist Media Inc] The only thing better than a photo of Tom Hiddleston staring into your soul while sporting an elegant suit, is a photo of him doing this while holding a cat. Hiddleston, a British actor with a Cambridge and RADA pedigree, glides from the Shakespearean stage into the Marvel comic book universe […]