Monthly finds

September 2022

BOOKS

  • Passing by Nella Larsen (1929)
  • Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus
  • The Book of Form and Emptiness by Ruth Ozeki

FILM

  • American Werewolf in London
    • The Cabin in the Woods

August 2022

Books

FILMS

  • Hit the Road (Iran, 2022)
  • Get Out (USA)
  • Jennifer’s Body (USA, 2009)
  • Nope (USA, 2022)

TV

  • American Horror Stories (USA, 2021)
  • The Newsreader (Australia, 2022)
  • American Horror Story season 1
  • Kate Bush at the BBC 1979

PLACES VISITED

  • Brandenburg Gate/Berlin Wall/Reichstag

July 2022

BOOKS

ART

  • Cornelia Parker at Tate Britain
  • Feminine Power at the British Museum
  • Sun and Sea at the Albany Theatre

THEATRE

  • Patriots at The Almeida

FILM

  • Elvis (2022)
  • Bob’s Burgers Movie (2022)
  • Jawbreaker (1999)
  • The Fly (1986)
  • Thor: Love and Thunder (2022)

TV

  • Severance
  • The Undeclared War
  • I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson (seasons 1 and 2)

PODCASTS/RADIO

  • Forgiveness: Stories from the Front Line (BBC Radio 4)
  • Slow Radio, A Day in the Life of Honey the Dog (BBC Radio 3)
  • The Long History of Argument (Radio 4)

June 2022

BOOKS

FILM

  • Everything Everywhere all at Once (2022)
  • All My Friends Hate Me (2022)

ART

  • The Woman in the Window exhibition at Dulwich Picture Gallery, London

TV

  • Pistol (2022)

May 2022

BOOKS

  • The Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead (2021)
  • 1922: Scenes from a Turbulent Year by Nick Rennison (2021)
  • Fear and Trembling by Amelie Nothomb (1999)

FILM

  • Navalny (2022)
  • The Bubble (2022)

ART

  • Walter Sickert and Hew Locke’s The Procession at Tate Britain

TV

  • Ted Lasso (Season 2)
  • Derry Girls (Season 3)
  • Ten Per Cent
  • Slow Horses
  • Eurovision

MUSIC

  • Harry’s Home by Harry Styles
  • We by Arcade Fire

POCASTS/RADIO

  • Lusus (Radio 4)
  • Putin (Radio 4)

April 2022

BOOKS

FILM

March 2022

BOOKS

  • Four Thousand Weeks: Time and How to Use It by Oliver Burkeman
  • Death and the Penguin by Andrey Kurkov
  • Middlemarch by George Eliot
  • Cold Earth by Sarah Moss
  • Fifty Sounds by Polly Barton
  • Amok by Stefan Zweig

FILMS

  • Ali and Ava (UK, 2021)
  • Misbehaviour (UK, 2020)
  • Turning Red (USA, 2021)
  • Olga (Switzerland, 2021)

ART

  • Louise Bourgeois, The Woven Child at the Hayward Gallery, London

TV

  • Pam and Tommy (Disney Plus)
  • Louis Theroux: Forbidden America (BBC)
  • Stacey Dooley: Inside the Convent (BBC)
  • Servant of the People (Ukraine, 2015 – via All 4)
  • Chloe (BBC)

PODCASTS

  • Room 5 (BBC)
  • Political Animals (BBC)

February 2022

BOOKS

FILM

  • Flee (Denmark, 2021)
  • Dave Made a Maze (USA, 2017)
  • Cyrano (USA/UK, 2021)

ART

  • Francis Bacon: Man and Beast at the Royal Academy of Arts

January 2022

BOOKS

  • A Moth to a Flame by Stig Dagerman (1948/1950/2019)
  • Mrs March by Virginia Feito (2021)
  • The Hour of the Star by Clarice Lispector (1977)
  • Sorrow and Bliss by Meg Mason (2021)
  • An Inspector Calls by J. B. Priestley (1945)
  • In Love with Hell by William Palmer (2021)
  • The Foundling by Stacey Halls (2020)
  • Territory of Light by Yuko Tsushima

FILM

  • Don’t Look Up (2021)
  • Freaky (2020)
  • Spiderman: No Way Home (2021)
  • Eternals (2021)
  • Drive My Car (Japan, 2021)
  • Parallel Mothers (Spain, 2021)

December 2021

BOOKS

TV

  • Turkish TV show Ethos (2020)
  • A Very British Scandal (2021)
  • Bridgerton season 1 (2020)
  • Aggretsuko season 1 (2018)

FILM

  • Last Night in Soho (2021)
  • Encanto (2021)
  • A Star is Born (1954)
  • The Meg (2018)

November 2021

BOOKS

FILM

October 2021

BOOKS

  • The Woman in the Dunes by Kobo Abe (1964)
  • Blaming by Elizabeth Taylor (1976)
  • The Book of Memory by Petina Gappah (2015)
  • A Whole Life by Robert Seethaler (2015)
  • A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles (2017)
  • Paula, Michael and Bob by Gerry Agar (2003)
  • The Tortilla Curtain by T. C. Boyle (2006)
  • The Loney by Andrew Michael Hurley (2015)

FILM

  • Catch Me If You Can (USA, 2003 – rewatched)
  • Zombieland (USA, 2009)
  • The French Dispatch (USA, 2021)
  • Dune (USA, 2021)

TV

  • Nine Perfect Strangers (2021)
  • Deutschland 1989 (2021)
  • Squid Game (South Korea, 2021)

Art Exhibitions

  • Helen Frankenthaler at Dulwich Picture Gallery, London
  • Paula Rego at Tate Britain, London
  • Turkish Art Week at the Saatchi Gallery, London

September 2021

BOOKS

  • Nervous Conditions by Tsitsi Dangarembga (1988)
  • Alligator and Other Stories by Dima Alzayat (2020)
  • Old Baggage by Lissa Evans (2018)
  • The Pursuit of Art by Martin Gayford (2019)

FILM

TV

  • Back to Life series 2
  • The White Lotus

August 2021

BOOKS

TV

  • Ghosts (season 3)
  • Pose (season 3)

ART

  • Tate Britain – Rothko’s Seagram Murals

THEATRE:

  • 2.22. A Ghost Story

FILM:

  • Free Guy (2021)
  • Souad (2021)

July 2021

BOOKS

TV

  • The Assassination of Gianni Versace (2018)
  • Sweet Tooth (2021)

FILM

ART

  • Tracy Emin/Munch: The Loneliness of the Soul at the Royal Academy

June 2021

BOOKS

TV

  • Bo Burnham’s Inside

FILM

  • Raya and the Last Dragon (2021)
  • Luca (2021)

POCASTS/RADIO

  • A Somewhat Complete History of Sitting Down

May 2021

  • Exciting Times by Naoise Dolan (2020)
  • When we Cease to Understand the World by Benjamin Labatut (2020)
  • Commonwealth by Ann Patchett (2016)
  • Haven’t They Grown by Sophie Hannah
  • A Girl Returned by Donatella Di Pietrantonio
  • What Are You Going Through by Sigrid Nunez

Film:

  • Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga (2020)
  • The Mitchells vs the Machines (2021)

TV:

  • Wellington Paranormal (New Zealand comedy series)
  • Motherland (UK parenting comedy, season 3)
  • Halston (Netflix fashion biopic series)
  • The Pursuit of Love (BBC mini series)

April 2021

Books:

  • Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro (2021)
  • Untraceable by Sergei Lebedev (2021)
  • Wars of the Interior by Jospeh Zarate (2021)
  • A Ghost in the Throat by Doireann Ni Ghriofa (2020)
  • Dear Life by Rachel Clarke (audio book) (2020)
  • The Wild Places by Robert MacFarlane (2009)
  • At Night All Blood is Black by David Diop (2018/2020)
  • Heavy Light by Horatio Clare (2021)
  • The Sleeping Beauties by Suzanne O’Sullivan (2021)

TV:

  • Stath Sells Flats (UK comedy series, Season 1)
  • Deutschland 86 (German Cold War spy drama series

Films:

  • Live Free or Die Hard (USA, 2007)
  • Palm Springs (USA, 2020)
  • Collective (Romania, 2019)

March 2021

Films:

  • Iron Man III (USA, 2013)
  • Die Tomorrow (Thailand, 2017)
  • Thor: The Dark World (USA, 2013)
  • Captain America: Winter Soldier (USA,2014)
  • Bill and Ted Face the Music (USA, 2020)

Television:

Books:

  • A Golden Age by Tahmima Anam (2007)
  • Slouching Towards Bethlehem by Joan Didion
  • The Hairdresser of Harare by Tendai Huchu (2010)
  • Charles Dickens by Claire Tomalin
  • How to Live. What to Do. by Josh Cohen (2021)
  • Another London (photography book)
  • Christina’s World by MoMA (book on Andrew Wyeth)
  • The Painting of Modern Life (art exhibition book)
  • The Glass Hotel by Emily St Mandel (2020)
  • A Lie Someone Told You About Yourself by Peter Ho Davies (2021)
  • At the Existential Cafe: Freedom, Being and Apricot Cocktails by Sarah Bakewell (2016)

February 2021

Films:

  • Game Night (USA, 2018)
  • Scott Pilgrim vs the World (USA, 2010)
  • Iron Man/Iron Man II/Thor/Avengers Assemble (USA, 2008-2012)
  • Easy A (USA, 2010)
  • A Life in a Day 2020 (USA, 2021)

TV

  • Call My Agent (French comedy drama series)
  • The Great (USA)
  • WandaVision (USA)

Books

  • Zadie Smith, Intimations
  • Patricia Highsmith, Edith’s Diary
  • Tom Lubbock, Great Works
  • John Guy, Henry VIII: The Quest for Fame
  • Jacob Ross, The Bone Readers
  • Susanna Clarke, Piranesi
  • George Orwell, Notes on Nationalism

January 2021

Films:

  • Diego Maradona (UK, 2019)
  • Men who Stare at Goats (USA, 2009)
  • Recorder: The Marion Stokes Project (USA, 2019)
  • Soul (USA, 2020)
  • Captain America: The First Avenger (USA, 2011)

Books:

  • The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper by Hallie Rubenhold
  • The Wandering by Intan Paramaditha
  • Art as Therapy by Alain de Botton
  • Such a Fun Age by Kiley Reid
  • Ali and Nino by Kurban Said
  • Light Perpetual by Francis Spufford

TV:

  • The Queen’s Gambit (USA, Netflix)
  • It’s a Sin (UK)

Audiobooks:

  • The Finer Points of Sausage Dogs by Alexander McCall Smith
  • Ramble Book by Adam Buxton

December 2020

Films:

  • Extra Ordinary (Ireland, 2019)

Books:

TV:

  • The Disability Paradox (UK documentary)
  • The Crown (UK drama, season 4)
  • Love and Anarchy (Swedish comedy drama)

Podcasts:

  • Where is George Gibney?

New music:

November 2020

Cultural plans for November

Books:

Film:

  • This is not a Burial, it’s a Resurrection (Lesotho, 2019)
  • Happy Gilmore (USA, 1996)
  • Kmêdeus (Cabo Verde, 2020)
  • Borat: Cultural Learnings of America (UK/USA, 1996 -rewatch)
  • 8, or The Soul Collector (South Africa, 2019)
  • Whisper of the Heart (Japan, 1995)
  • The Rocky Horror Picture Show (UK, 1975 – watched many times before!)
  • On a le temps pour nous (Burkina Faso, 2019)
  • Black Book (Netherlands, 2020)
  • Without Gorky (UK, 2011)

Art

  • Tate Modern, online walk-through of the Andy Warhol expedition
  • Tate Liverpool, online walk-through of the Don McCullin exhibition

Television:

  • The Frank Gardner Story (UK)
  • Truth Seekers (UK)
  • Ratched (USA)
  • Bake Off (UK reality cooking competition)
  • The Undoing (USA)

Radio/Podcasts:

  • BBC Radio 4, Lights Out, From the Ashes of New Cross (UK)
  • BBC Sounds, The Wedding Detectives

New music:

October 2020

October’s top reads

All the books I read in October:

  • Transfer Window by Maria Gerhardt
  • Outside Looking In by T C Boyle
  • Clothes and other things that matter by Alexandra Shulman
  • The Sickness by Alberto Barrera Tyszka
  • Sisters by Daisy Johnson
  • When I Hit You: Or, A Portrait of the Writer as a Young Wife by Meena Kandasany
  • Dear Reader: The Comfort and Joy of Books by Cathy Rentzenbrink
  • The Pear Field by Nana Ekvtimishvili

The films I watched in October:

  • Wadjda (Saudi Arabia, 2012)
  • Enola Holmes (UK, 2020)
  • The Screaming Man (L’homme qui cri) (Chad, 2010)
  • As I Open my Eyes (Tunisia, 2015)
  • One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (rewatch) (USA, 1975)
  • Supa Modo! (Kenya, 2018)
  • The Wedding Ring (Niger, 2016)
  • Time (USA, 2020)
  • Borat Subsequent Moviefilm (USA, 2020)
  • Beetlejuice (rewatch) (USA, 1988)
  • Dhalinyaro (Youth) (Djibouti, 2019)

TV I watched in October:

  • Misfits season 1 (UK, 2009): obscenely funny
  • Misfits season 2 (UK, 2010): plots getting sillier, but still obscene and hilarious. I love Robert Sheehan
  • Ghosts season 2 (UK, 2020): gentle and funny
  • The History of Writing (documentary, UK, 2020): informative and impressed with their pre-COVID travel budget

Podcast listened to:

  • Futile Attempts by Kim Noble – tragicomic and surreal

September 2020

Books:

  • Katherine Mansfield short stories
  • Summerwater by Sarah Moss
  • Negative Capability by Michele Roberts
  • The Western Wind by Samantha Harvey
  • Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me by Kate Clanchy
  • The Great Godden by Meg Rosoff
  • The Silent Woman: Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes by Janet Malcolm
  • On Time and Water by Andri Snaer Magnason

Film

TV

  • I Hate Suzie
  • The Politician (season 1)
  • The Art of Japanese Life
  • Us
  • Simon Schama on The Romantics

August 2020

Books:

  • In Extremis: The Life of War Correspondent Marie Colvin by Lindsey Hilsum
  • Paradise by Abdulrazak Gurnah
  • Red Dust Road by Jackie Kay
  • Family Lexicon by Natalia Ginzburg
  • The Past by Tessa Hadley
  • My Mansfield Project by Kirsty Gunn
  • A Death in the Neighbourhood by Susannah Berne
  • Little Eyes by Samanta Schweblin

Film:

  • A Private War
  • Much Much Amore
  • Team America
  • Burn After Reading

TV:

Mandy (comedy series)

July 2020

Books:

  • When Time Stopped by Ariana Neumann
  • Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett
  • Frank Bowling by Elena Crippa
  • Harald Sohlberg: Infinite Landscapes
  • On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong
  • The Bookshop by Penelope Fitzgerald
  • The Summer Book by Tove Jansson
  • Big Sky by Kate Atkinson

Film:

TV:

  • A House through Time
  • Space Force
  • The Crown season 3

Podcast:

  • Cautionary Tales

June 2020

Books:

Film:

TV

  • Mallory Towers
  • The Big Flower Fight
  • Age of the Image
  • Hollywood
  • Killing Eve (rewatch)
  • Staged
  • What we do in the Shadows
  • I May Destroy You

May 2020

Books:

TV:

  • Normal People
  • Hospital: Coronavirus Special
  • Upload
  • Sewing Bee

Film:

Podcast:

  • The Last Days of August

April 2020

Books:

  • Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier (re-read)
  • Actress by Anne Enright (audiobook)
  • Green Smoke by Rosemary Manning (kid’s book!)
  • The Wall by Marlen Haushofen
  • English Monsters by James Scudamore
  • The Bass Rock by Evie Wyld
  • Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick

TV:

  • Tiger King (true crime series on Netflix)
  • National Theatre live, Jane Eyre

Film:

  • Hairspray (2007)
  • Gloria (2013)

March 2020

Books:

  • Baho! by Roland Rugero
  • The Shadow King by Maaza Mengiste
  • The Water Dancer by Ta-Nehisi Coates (audio book)
  • Loop by Brenda Lozano
  • Sweet Sorrow by David Nicholls
  • A Small Revolution in Germany by Philip Hensher (audio book)
  • The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood

Film:

Art exhibition:

  • Among the Trees at the Hayward Gallery, London

TV:

  • Bonus Family (Swedish comedy drama) on Netflix UK
  • Intelligence (UK comedy series on Sky)
  • Breeders (UK comedy series on Sky)

February 2020

Books:

Films:

Exhibition:

TV

  • Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened

January 2020

Books:

  • Sinéad Gleeson, Constellations
  • Romesh Gunesekera, Suncatcher
  • Graham Greene, Brighton Rock (audio book)
  • Shirley Jackson, The Haunting of Hill House
  • Jane Harper, Force of Nature
  • Ismail Kadare, Broken April
  • Michèle Gazier, Virginia Woolf
  • Jamaica Kincaid, Lucy
  • Ismail Kadare, The Doll
  • Taffy Brodesser-Akner, Fleishman is in Trouble
  • Bernardine Evaristo, Girl, Woman, Other
  • Claudio Morandini, Snow, Dog, Foot

Film:

Exhibition:

  • Troy: Myth and Reality @ The British Museum
  • Dora Maar @ Tate Modern

TV/podcasts:

  • Avenue 5
  • The Windermere Children

December 2019

Books:

Film:

  • Cats

Exhibitions:

TV/podcast:

  • His Dark Materials (UK TV dramatization)
  • Upright (Australian comedy series)
  • Pose (US series by Ryan Murphy, second season)

November 2019

Books:

  • Robert Harris, The Second Sleep
  • Hanne Ørstavik, Love

Film:

Exhibition:

  • Jide Odukoya, Turn it Up: On Paradoxes at the Horniman Museum

TV:

  • UK TV comedy series Ghosts
  • UK drama Gold Digger

October 2019

Books:

  • Margaret Atwood, The Testaments
  • Scholastique Mukasonga, Our Lady of the Nile
  • Zadie Smith, Grand Union (short story collection)
  • Emilie Pine, Notes to Self (essay collection)
  • Elizabeth Taylor, Mrs Claremont at the Palfrey
  • Mary Costello, The River Capture
  • Marjane Satrapi, The Complete Persepolis
  • Ann Patchett, The Dutch House

Films:

Exhibition/art:

  • Into the Night: Cabarets and Clubs in Modern Art, at the Barbican, London
  • Kara Walker’s installation in the Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall

TV:

  • UK comedy series Motherland

September 2019

Books:

Films:

Exhibitions:

TV shows:

  • UK comedy series State of the Union
  • UK comedy series Defending the Guilty

August 2019

Film:

  • Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

Exhibition:

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