Rereading Harry Potter during the COVID-19 pandemic means finding new ways of identifying with the characters, especially in the seventh book, where Harry finds himself struggling with isolation.
Homer and Aeschylus turned to the divine to write their happy endings. But no gods are conspiring above the US, ready to swoop down and save humankind from itself.
Penny dreadfuls told real stories of murder and mayhem to 19th-century audiences seeking escape from city life. True crime podcasts have a lot in common with them.
Literature funding has been cut brutally in recent years and writers’ incomes are disastrously low. Yet books shape our national identity, forming an often invisible bedrock for the wider economy.
During the second world war, people found solace in the formulaic narratives of historical romances and during the pandemic they could once again provide readers comfort.
A new Netflix adaptation of Rebecca stars Lily James and Armie Hammer. The novel on which it is based, first published in 1938, explores domestic entrapment.
Wild coastlines, rich folklore and a sense that it’s a place unto itself, at once England and not, has made Cornwall the ideal setting for Gothic tales.
In Oscar Wilde’s novel, ‘The Picture of Dorian Gray,’ a painted portrait of the protagonist becomes ugly and twisted with age, much like Trump is represented as reflecting all of America’s evils.