The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE reviews Sebastian, Four Mothers, Restless, and The Most Precious of Cargoes
Latest editorial
The upside of regicide
GAVIN O’TOOLE relishes an account of the ideological creativity that was sparked by the abolition of the monarchy in England
BOOKS
JOHN GREEN explores the argument that psychiatry needs to move away from the idea of just seeing and treating the individual
SYLVIA HIKINS applauds a polemic against “cleanfluencers” and considers radical alternatives to current inequalities of housework
RUTH AYLETT admires the blunt honesty with which a woman’s experience is recorded, but detects the unexamined privilege that underlies it
IAN SINCLAIR draws attention to the powerful role that literature plays in foreseeing the way humanity will deal with climate crisis
High quality pulp, rollicking online murders, Abnorman Britain, and high skates drama: reviews of The Get Off, Everyone In The Group Chat Dies, Pagans and First To Fall
DENNIS BROE notes what happens to content when the streaming giants incorporate AI and deregulation into their economic models
The Blazing World: A New History of Revolutionary England
Jonathan Healey, Bloomsbury, £30
WHAT better way to mark the coronation of Charles III than to recall the execution of his predecessor, Charles I, as the crowning moment of a revolution?
The dethronement of Charles in 1649 ushered in an unprecedented experiment in republicanism amid extraordinary ideological ferment the like of which England has not experienced since.
Given the forthcoming accession of his namesake, it is tempting to make comparisons between the 17th-century monarch and that of today.
More from this author
GAVIN O’TOOLE explores the resistance expressed by central American artists to their own erasure by US imperialist policies
Here’s an antidote to the Venezuela election-induced tantrums of Western elites. GAVIN O’TOOLE reviews it
GAVIN O’TOOLE applauds an analysis of culture that explains why political conflicts today are focused more on values and identity than the economy and social questions
GAVIN O’TOOLE observes that the call for a new international framework for conflict mediation is fatally marred by a partisan position on the Isreali-Gazan conflict