On James Baldwin
By Colm Tóibín
Brandeis University Press, €20
What a privilege to read a literary great dissect the craft of “one of his most consequential literary progenitors”. Published in the centenary year of Baldwin’s birth, Tóibín delivers an intimate reading of the American writer’s work in this astute, accessible book. Discussions centre around Baldwin’s seminal work, Go Tell It on the Mountain, examining also Giovanni’s Room and Baldwin’s essay writing. There is a surprisingly intimate section where Tóibín discusses a time he spent in Barcelona “where homosexuals were plenty but images of gay life were scarce”. The personal and political resonance of Baldwin’s work is explored sensitively by the author, who shares with his subject a “glittering mind” with thought “embodied in style”. Brigid O’Dea
Inside Rural Ireland: Power and Change Since Independence
Edited by Tomás Finn and Tony Varley
UCD Press, €30
Rural Ireland has changed beyond measure since independence, but land remains “overwhelmingly in male hands”, according to Inside Rural Ireland. Just 18,000 farms were owned by women in 2020, up by only a few hundred in a decade, and women remain “at one remove” from land inheritances. However, the essays challenge the notion that rural Ireland is dying. And it may yet thrive in a world where remote working and transport connections are more important than agriculture. In 1943, Éamon de Valera spoke of “comely maidens at the crossroads”, living in Catholic piety. Today, argues Mary E Daly, his vision – minus his conservative instincts – has come true. Mark Hennessy
On the Edge: The Art of Risking Everything
By Nate Silver
Allen Lane, £30
Initially conceived as a book about gambling, On the Edge expanded exponentially to encompass game theory, venture capital and the opportunities and challenges presented by artificial intelligence. Silver is a statistician, political analyst and professional poker player who founded influential US polling website FiveThirtyEight, and who counts gamblers, tech wizards and entrepreneurs among his friends. Silver believes that these professional risk-takers, from poker sharks to crypto currency betters, have a lot in common, and much that we can learn from.
More academic textbook than self-help manual, On the Edge is not an easy read; the first half is particularly heavy on poker analogies (Silver goes into minute detail on various televised games). It’s a deep dive into the stats and science behind risk, before, perhaps weirdly, ending with some frightening warnings about the potential of AI to destroy human life, based on the p(doom) – probability of doom – warnings from major players in the tech world. John Walshe
Author Nicola Dinan: ‘Working as a lawyer taught me how much can turn on a single word’
Bonnard by Isabelle Cahn review: Shrewd and illuminating on an artist more radical than Picasso
Wild Thing: A Life of Paul Gauguin - Sad, fascinating and highly troubling
The Magic of Silence: Caspar David Friedrich’s Journey Through Time review – An intriguing take on the life and work of the German painter
The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze
By William Saroyan
Faber, £9.99
This collection of 26 short stories was an immediate bestseller when first published in 1934. Now, Faber has reprinted it with a passionate introduction by Stephen Fry, clearly believing, 90 years later, it still has the power to seduce readers. Many of the characters are immigrants and for this reason the collection might resonate with today’s readers as we face a global crisis on immigration and the displacement of people. Set in Great Depression-era San Francisco, these stories deal with bleak topics: joblessness, homelessness and loneliness. However, they are written with pathos and humour and are more uplifting than one might imagine. A thought-provoking and stimulating read. Ilse McDonagh
The Magic of an Irish Rainforest: A Visual Journey
By Eoghan Daltun
Hachette Books Ireland, £24.99
Rewilder Eoghan Daltun’s exquisite photography and words create a precious window on to our rich last fragments of native Irish rainforest. Informative, poetic writing extends this way beyond a coffee-table book. To regenerate and spread, all our rainforests need is for us to protect them from overgrazing. “Allowing sheep, goats, and deer to freely destroy our last vestiges of ancient rainforest by eating every tree seedling is akin to giving free rein to an army of vandals to smash and loot the contents of all our national museums and historic monuments – with the not insignificant difference that we ... are wholly dependent on wild, natural ecosystems for our survival,” writes Daltun. Through him, our last beautiful rainforests call for the chance to rebirth. Adrienne Murphy
Last Night
By Sven Popović, tr. Vinko Zgaga
Dalkey Archive Press, £12.99
A hangover marks the end of an evening and the beginning of an interrogation: Where’s my wallet? What happened? Few understand these questions better than Croatian author Sven Popović, whose collection of stories, Last Night, is a masterful study of hangxiety.
Published in 2015 and newly translated into English by Vinko Zgaga, its quixotic characters look for answers in the clubs and coffeehouses of Münster, Madrid, Berlin, and Zagreb. They draw chalk butterflies that come to life, negotiate with a team of overworked Fates, and lose their shadows. With its fragmentary plots and musical epithets, Last Night occupies the space between revelry and reckoning. It’s a paean to the post-punk scene; magical realism for minimalists that never gets too cynical nor too serious. Kristen Malone Poli
