Every year since 1901 Nobel Prizes have been awarded in the fields of Physics, Chemistry, Physiology or Medicine, Literature and Peace. The awards system was founded by Alfred Nobel, a Swedish chemist and engineer who left money in his will when he died in 1896 with an instruction that it be used to award prizes to those who have ‘during the preceding year… conferred the greatest benefit to Mankind‘. Continue reading “Food and eccentricity”
Category: The Novel
Women and independence
During the two long lockdowns that were imposed in the UK during the Covid-19 pandemic, I – like many others in the population – took to going for long walks most days. Limited to the routes I could take, to alleviate the boredom I started listening to podcasts, one of which – Backlisted – became a favourite. Continue reading “Women and independence”
A miracle in suburbia
In my last post I wrote about the value Clare Chambers grants suburban life in her 2020 novel Small Pleasures. Her protagonist, Jean Swinney, unmarried, in her early 40s and living in the suburbs of South East London with her widowed mother, leads a life of routine and duty, punctuated by ‘[s]mall pleasures – the first cigarette of the day; a glass of sherry before Sunday lunch; a bar of chocolate parcelled out to last a week; a newly published library book still pristine and untouched by other hands; the first hyacinths of spring; a neatly folded pile of ironing..’ Continue reading “A miracle in suburbia”
Food as distraction
Just under two years ago I wrote a post about Elizabeth Jane Howard’s novel The Light Years, the first novel in a series of five – The Cazalet Chronicles – a family saga spanning three generations and unfolding between 1937 and 1950. The Light Years covers the build-up to the Second World War and – in culinary terms – is a masterclass in the writer’s use of food to locate a story in a particular moment in time. Continue reading “Food as distraction”