In this week’s TLS
We sometimes use the phrase “Oulipian constraint” metaphorically at the TLS, for an idea that thrives within tight spaces and self-imposed restrictions
Showcase
Shooting sharp quills in every line
A monument of scholarship in the service of John Donne
Academy of intellectual scorn
The group that freed themselves by inventing rules
Contents
Shooting sharp quills in every line
A monument of scholarship in the service of John Donne
Free, indirect and vitriolic
The full, brutal force of male vice in Fernanda Melchor's Hurricane Season
Academy of intellectual scorn
The group that freed themselves by inventing rules
Melancholy blue child
The enduring appeal of a gay bohemian author: William S. Burroughs
Cutting edge
Two major Beat figures: Brion Gysin and William S. Burroughs
Blood on the tracks
Abundant suffering and little blame in Jeanine Cummins’s American Dirt
Waiting for the barbarians
The real and the fantastical in David Constantine's The Dressing-Up Box and Sarah Hall's Sudden Traveller
Just doing their thing
Confronting fractured worlds in Elleke Boehmer's To The Volcano
Only compare
An editorial, originally unsigned, on Comparative Literature by George Steiner, first published in the TLS on March 12, 1964
Can’t go on. Go on.
Is it the best of times or the worst of times to be a satirist?; a new production of Endgame; Oulipo and the group of writers and scientists striving for "potential literature"