Arts General

Many people will recognise the famous zebra crossing. Some visitors may have graffitied their name on its hallowed outer walls. Others might even have managed to penetrate the iron gates. But what draws in these thousands of fans here, year after year? What is it that really happens behind the doors of the most celebrated recording studio in the world? It may have begun life as an affluent suburban house, but it soon became a creative hub renowned around the world as a place where great music, ground-breaking sounds and unforgettable tunes were forged - nothing less than a witness to, and a key participant in, the history of popular music itself. 

A legendary singer, folklorist, and music historian, Shirley Collins has been an integral figure in the English folk music scene for more than sixty years. In this memoir, she tells the story of that lifelong relationship with English folksong - a dedication to artistic integrity that has guided her through the triumphs and tragedies of her life.

Millions of people climb the grand marble staircase into New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art every year. But only a select few have unrestricted access to every nook and cranny. They're the guards in dark blue suits keeping careful watch over this vast treasure house. Caught up in the early days of a glamorous journalism career Patrick Bringley never thought he'd be one of them. Then his brother was diagnosed with fatal cancer and he needed to escape the mundane clamour of daily life. So he quit and sought solace in the most beautiful place he knew.

To his surprise this temporary refuge becomes his home away from home for a decade. We follow him as he guards delicate treasures from Egypt to Rome strolls the labyrinths beneath the galleries and discovers how restorative art can be. Bringley enters the museum as a ghost silent and almost invisible but soon finds his voice and place amongst the lively subculture of museum guards. As his bonds with colleagues and the artwork grow he learns how fortunate he is to be walled off in this little world and how much it resembles the best aspects of the larger world to which he gradually gratefully returns. All the Beauty in the World is a moving revelatory portrait of one of the world's great museums and its treasures by someone whose value is often overlooked: the museum guard.

The extraordinary true story of the invention of European porcelain focusing on alchemist Johann Frederick Bottger who inadvertently discovered the arcanum; Johan Gregor Herold, an ambitious artist who developed colours and patterns of unparalleled brilliance and Johann Joachim Kaendler, a virtuoso sculptor who used the Meissen porcelain to invent a new art form.

Since its beginnings during WW2, television has assumed a central role in our houses and our lives. Television has created controversy, brought coronations and World Cups into living rooms, allowed us access to 24hr news and media and as shows come and go in popularity, the history of television shows us how our society has changed.

For decades, feminist artists have confronted the problem of how to tell the truth about their experiences as bodies. Queer bodies, sick bodies, racialised bodies, female bodies, what is their language, what are the materials we need to transcribe it? Exploring the ways in which feminist artists have taken up this challenge, Art Monsters is a landmark intervention in how we think about art and the body, calling attention to a radical heritage of feminist work that not only reacts against patriarchy but redefines its own aesthetic aims.

Writing in the tradition of Susan Sontag, Hélène Cixous and Maggie Nelson, Lauren Elkin demonstrates her power as a cultural critic, weaving daring links between disparate artists and writers - from Julia Margaret Cameron's photography to Kara Walker's silhouettes, Vanessa Bell's portraits to Eva Hesse's rope sculptures, Carolee Schneemann's body art to Theresa Hak Kyung Cha's trilingual masterpiece DICTEE - and shows that their work offers a potent celebration of beauty and excess, sentiment and touch, the personal and the political.

Art and science are often considered to be in conflict, with art dealing in creativity and science in cold, hard facts. But the two disciplines have always been interconnected, taking inspiration from each other and shaping each other's worlds.

In this fascinating 20-part series, Sir Ian Blatchford, Director of the Science Museum, and Dr Tilly Blyth, the Science Museum's Head of Collections, reveal how science's ingenuity has been incorporated into artistic expression - and how art's creativity has stimulated scientific progress and technological change.

Beginning with the Enlightenment and concluding with our modern-day Age of Ambivalence, they take a chronological journey through 250 years of British history, looking at the often surprising relationships between iconic works of art and key scientific objects and ideas. 

A study of the life and ideas of the poet W H Auden examined within the context of the wars, ideologies, spiritual pursuits and sexual attitudes of the 20th century.

Ludwig van Beethoven: to some, simply the greatest ever composer of Western classical music. Yet his life remains shrouded in myths. Oxford professor Laura Tunbridge cuts through the noise. With each chapter focusing on a period of his life, a piece of music and a revealing theme, she provides a rich insight into the man and his works. With a wealth of new material, this is a compelling, accessible portrayal of one of the world's most creative minds and it will transform how you listen for ever.

Simon Callow plunges headlong into Wagner's world to discover what it was like to be Wagner, and to be around one of music's most influential figures. The perfect introduction to the Master, a hundred and thirty-five years after his death, Richard Wagner's music dramas stand at the centre of the culture of classical music.

Poet Ian McMillan is our host in this gleeful game of literary tomfoolery, outrageous parody and biting wit. Joining him for some lighthearted competitive wordplay are a quartet of writers and comedians, all ready and eager to run riot through the halls of great literature.

Their bookish challenges include 'New Beginnings and Endings', which sees them topping and tailing well-known literary works to produce some very tall tales, 'Sound Effects', where they have to guess a book title from a mélange of sounds, and 'Conversation Consequences', where they imagine some unlikely meetings between fictional characters. Mrs Malaprop shares a Jacuzzi with Eliza Doolittle, Inspector Clouseau takes Blanche Dubois to a dance and The Dong with the luminous nose honks hooters with Cyrano de Bergerac...

Distinguished literary critic John Sutherland takes an idiosyncratic look at the world of the Brontës, from the bumps on Charlotte’s head to the nefarious origins of Mr Rochester’s fortune, by way of astral telephony, letterwriting dogs, an exploding peat bog, and much, much more. Also features ‘Jane Eyre abbreviated’ by John Crace, author of the Guardian’s ‘Digested Reads’ column – read Charlotte Brontë’s masterpiece in five minutes!

Cathedrals are among the most imposing, astonishing, and inspiring buildings in Europe. Regardless of faith, their architectural daring has never ceased to spark wonder. This guide traces the development of the cathedral from its earliest beginnings as a Bishop's house, up to the most extravagant contemporary designs around the world. In doing so, it sheds light on social, religious, and architectural history, as well as bringing the story of these extraordinary buildings to life.

In this authoritative study of the painter, widely regarded as the father of modern art, Richard Verdi traces the evolution of Cezanne's landscape, still-life and figure compositions, from the turbulently romantic creations of his youth to the visionary masterpieces of his final years.

The definitive biography of a man who was a hardworking journalist, tireless supporter of liberal social causes but, most of all, a great novelist and creator of characters who live on in the English imagination.

On a journey that takes her from Afghanistan to the Australian outback; from China to the saffron harvest in Spain, the author discovers the history of colour. From the efforts of artists and artisans to reproduce the rainbow, to the impact of their work on the world.

The BBC Radio 4 series that inspired the bestselling book Eats, Shoots & Leaves The runaway success of Eats, Shoots & Leaves brought millions of grammar geeks out of the closet and made it cool to care about punctuation. This is the radio series that started it all: five programmes in which Lynne Truss explores changing fashions in punctuation. She accompanies the founder of the Apostrophe Protection Society through Berwick Street Market on a hunt for the 'greengrocer's apostrophe', enters the classroom to hear how children learn punctuation, and finds out whether anyone punctuates text messages.

Talking to writers and experts like Fay Weldon and David Crystal, she discovers the origins of the comma in Greek drama and Gregorian chant, considers the case for 'semi-colonic irrigation' and asks how a writer's choice of punctuation expresses his tone of voice.Looking into the future, she wonders if 'emoticons' will put colons, commas and apostrophes on the endangered species list. Impassioned, informative and always amusing, this is an essential listen for anyone who loves language.

From an Edwardian childhood in Manchester, Dodie Smith became one of the most successful female dramatists of her generation with her play 'Dear Octopus' in 1938, and then her children's book 'The 101 Dalmations' made her a household name when Disney filmed it. This biography conjures up not only England in the 20s and 30s, and a Golden Age of British theatre, but also the life of an ambitious, talented, yet vulnerable woman.

W B Gooderham is fascinated by second-hand books and curates a growing collection of those featuring intriguing inscriptions. The messages he finds range from the awkward scratchings of adolescent infatuation, to the resentful recriminations of a love affair gone sour and offer illuminating glimpses into their books' own secret histories.

The music of the medieval, Renaissance, and baroque periods have been repeatedly discarded and rediscovered ever since they were new. An interest in music of the past has been characteristic of a part of the musical world since the early 19th century.

In recent years this interest has taken on particular meaning, representing two specific trends: first, a rediscovery of little-known underappreciated repertories, and second, an effort to recover lost performing styles. Much has been gained in the 20th century from the study and revival of instruments, playing techniques, and repertories.

In this Very Short Introduction, Thomas Forrest Kelly frames chapters on the forms, techniques, and repertories practices of the medieval, Renaissance, and baroque periods with discussion of why old music has been and should be revived, as well as a short history of early music revivals. 

Quentin Bell provides a remarkable collection of pen portraits - of his parents Vanessa and Clive; of his aunt and uncle, Virginia and Leonard Woolf; of Roger Fry, E M Forster, Ottoline Morrell, Maynard Keynes, Lytton Strachey and many more. In writing about them he also tells the story of his own work: his employment as agricultural labourer, his career as artist and teacher of art, critic, writer, and as reluctant spokesman of Bloomsbury.

Harry Mount and John Davie unlock the wisdom of the past in this light-hearted and fascinating book, revealing how ancient Latin can help us to live better in the present.

Every journey has its stories. Beginning with Enid Blyton and childhood in the Isle of Purbeck, Peter Fiennes embarks on a unique exploration of Britain. He follows in the footsteps of some our greatest writers, tracing the paths recorded in their books, journals and diaries. How much has time changed us? And has it been for better, or worse? Are we trapped in the past? Footnotes is a lyrical foray into our past and present, and a mesmerising quest to picture these isles anew.

Throughout its long history, crime fiction has broadened our horizons, introducing us to unfamiliar places, people and cultures and showing us new ways of looking at the world. In this fascinating series, Mark Lawson takes a global tour of the genre, putting detective novels under the magnifying glass to examine how they have depicted - and predicted - social and political change.

Focussing on famous fictional investigators - from Hercule Poirot, Jules Maigret, Van der Valk and Martin Beck; through Dalgliesh, Rebus, Jane Tennison and Harry Hole; to Benny Griessel, Tess Monaghan and Easy Rawlins - he explores what these iconic protagonists can tell us about the historic character of their nations. Through the framework of their cases, he pursues the shadows of the Second World War and the Cold War; conflicts between the politics of the left and right; the rise of nationalism; and the pressures caused by migration. He also finds out how crime novels have portrayed transitional societies in South Africa and Northern Ireland; examined the legacies of military rule in Argentina and the Castro revolution in Cuba; and tackled post-colonialism in Australia and Nigeria.

Helping Lawson with his inquiries are authors including Andrea Camilleri, who discusses the effects of both the Mafia and Berlusconi on Italian society; Brian McGilloway, who talks about the Troubles and the wave of Irish crime fiction that the peace process has provoked; and Petros Markaris, whose detective series prophesied the Greek financial crisis.

Plus, Laura Lippman and Walter Mosley reveal how they introduced the experience of women and black Americans into their work; Russian writer Boris Akunin and Ukrainian novelist Andrey Kurkov meditate on Dostoevsky, Putin, censorship and their different approaches to crime writing; and in a special episode on TV detectives, Lawson talks to creative talent from the ITV hit Broadchurch, the Danish show The Killing and the French success Spiral about the medium's suitability as a crime scene and the rise of female investigators.

In 2007, Bolton Crown Court sentenced Shaun Greenhalgh to four years and eight months in prison for the crime of producing artistic forgeries. Working out of a shed in his parents' garden, Greenhalgh had successfully fooled some of the world's greatest museums. During the court case, the breadth of his forgeries shocked the art world and tantalised the media. What no one realised was how much more of the story there was to tell.

Franz Schubert was a beautiful, brilliant, modest boy who sprang to fully fledged genius at the age of sixteen; an unrecognised master who died almost penniless at the age of thirty-one. But, as revealed in this dramatised biography (lavishly illustrated with musical examples), there was a secret, darker side to Schubert which only renders his story that much more fascinating.

Every single one of Stephen Fry's ties - whether floral, fluorescent, football themed; striped or spotty, outrageous or simply debonair - tells an intimate tale about a moment in Stephen's life.Inspired by Stephen's hugely popular Instagram posts, this book will celebrate his expansive collection of man's greatest clothing companion: The Tie, in all it's sophisticated glory.Distinctively funny and offering witty asides, facts and personal stories, this book will make the perfect gift for anyone who has ever worn a tie.

A radical look at Jane Austen as you've never seen her - as a lover of farce, comic theatre and juvenilia. Paula Byrne celebrates Britain's favourite novelist 200 years after her death and explores why her books make such awesome movies time after time.

The Arnolfini portrait, painted by Jan van Eyck in 1434, is one of the world's most famous paintings. Scholars and the public alike have puzzled over the meaning of this haunting gem of medieval art. Using her acclaimed forensic skills as an art historian, Carola Hicks set out to decode the mystery, uncovering a few surprises along the way.

A concise overview of Verdi, the man and the artist, tracing his ascent from humble beginnings to the status of a cultural patriarch of the new Italy, whose cause he had done much to promote, and the operatic world in which he worked.

Many of us encounter a globe as children. We find a grown-up and ask, "Where are we?" They spin the globe and point to a minuscule dot amidst a massive expanse of sea and land. Thousands of questions follow. A profound convergence of art and science, a globe is the ultimate visualization of our place in our galaxy and universe. To be a globemaker requires a knowledge of geography, skilled engineering, drawing, and painting, and only a few people in history have ever really mastered the craft. When Peter Bellerby set out to make a globe for his father's eightieth birthday, after failing to find a suitable one to purchase, he had no idea where the process would lead. He went on to establish Bellerby & Co, one of the only artisan globemakers in the world. 

The Globemakers brings us inside Bellerby's gorgeous studio to learn how he and his team of cartographers and artists bring these stunning celestial, terrestrial, and planetary objects to life. Along the way he tells stories of his adventure and the luck along the way that shaped the company. A full-color photographic portrait of a lost art, The Globemakers is an enlightening exploration of globes, or "earth apples," as they were first known, and their ability to show us ourselves and our place in an infinite universe.

At seven years old Min Kym was the youngest ever pupil at the Purcell School of Music. At twenty-one she found a rare 1696 Stradivarius, perfectly suited to her build and temperament. Her career soared and a world tour was planned. Then, in a train station café, her violin was stolen from her side. In an instant her world collapsed. She descended into a terrifying limbo land, unable to play another note.

A A Milne, the creator of Winnie-the-Pooh, based the fictional Christopher Robin on his own son. This heart-warming and touching book offers the reader a glimpse into the relationship between Milne and the real-life Christopher Robin, whose toys inspired the magical world of the Hundred Acre Wood.

What is art? Why do we value images of saints, kings, goddesses, battles, landscapes or cities from eras of history utterly remote from ourselves? This history of art shows how painters, sculptors and architects have expressed the belief systems of their age. From the ancient civilisations of Egypt, Mesopotamia and Greece, to the revolutionary years of the 19th and 20th centuries, the artist has acted as a mirror to the ideals and conflicts of the human mind.

Richard Fawkes tells the fascinating story of over a thousand years of Western classical music and it's composers. From Gregorian chant to Stravinsky and Henryk Gorecki - the first living classical composer to get into the pop album charts - performances from some of the most highly praised recordings of recent years illustrate the narrative.

Since its origins in the sixteenth century, opera has been an extravagant, costly affair, arousing great passions. It has also produced some of the most sublime works of art, from Monteverdi to Wagner. Here Richard Fawkes traces the history of opera up to the present day, featuring more than seventy-five musical examples.