What a great interview by @georgemonaghan.bsky.social on the joys and agonies of being the internet's biggest book critic:

The English have begun to hate Weekend Report: The rise of Anglo Saxon Nationalism

'The word novel means new. It’s a really simple action, it’s really clear and it’s really powerful.' Charlie Porter talks to @georgemonaghan.bsky.social about his brilliant, #GoldsmithsPrize2025 shortlisted, novel, Nova Scotia House www.newstatesman.com/culture/book...

For a while, before the violence and shouts of “Heil fucking Hitler”, it felt like a nationalist street party. Tommy Robinson's day of rage: www.newstatesman.com/politics/202...

THE FIGHT BACK by Andrew Marr Farage rises. Burnham watches. But Starmer fights on. This week's cover. Read on below:

Was fun joining Niall Paterson of @news.sky.com and @georgemonaghan.bsky.social last week, to talk about working with the ever energetic @zackpolanski.bsky.social on @londonassembly.bsky.social. podfollow.com/skynewsdaily

In the @newstatesman.com: History will be written by the scrollers. It will anoint no anachronisms. Great move of Yvette Cooper to have a go at TikTok. Makes a fellow think - perhaps time to get sigma at vertical video and devious griddies!

The Online Safety Act humiliates us all. Labour should not expose its public to extortion and shame. It is way off-mission. PS don't call people Jimmy Savile! In @newstatesman.com:

The landlord stranglehold. How will Generation Rent ever find a home? @georgemonaghan.bsky.social‬

"Lofty views have long moved thoughtful souls to reflect on their property portfolios. ...Everything the light touched was a landlord's." The landlord sranglehold!

“You’re headed for a catastrophe,” she said. I told her I felt it was the kind of catastrophe I didn’t want to avoid. She went back to Montpellier and I went back to Pablo. Really pleased that yday's post about Francois Gilot and Picasso has become my most liked ever! dunno why!

🚨SOME PERSONAL NEWS🚨 I have learned how to edit the below type of screenshot in order to promote my self-compiled self-published ebook of my writings from the last 12 months. Cover and contents in replies, link in bio. Thanks all :)

Whoever smelt it dealt it! That new odor is a £295 Pride and Prejudice perfume, on sale only at Harrods. Freya Graham was at the launch breakfast for a lively write-up that I am pleased to have seen through. Smells like Jane Austen:

Had an interesting afternoon at the Palestine Action protest today. The first time I have been asked "Are you a terrorist, sir?"

Really pleased to have blown past 250 subscribers on Peaceable Land🤠 An editor explained a rejection: ‘I like it but how many of us can there be? 500 in the whole world?’ Halfway there!

A great piece by @georgemonaghan.bsky.social for @newstatesman.com including a mention for @markhussey.bsky.social's 'Mrs Dalloway: Biography of a novel', which is out now! #booksky #woolf

It's Dalloway Day folks, and one hundred years since publication. So pleased to have written about Virginia Woolf in the NS on such a great day:

For Virginia Woolf, stream of consciousness was a method. Now, it’s a way of life. 📕 @georgemonaghan.bsky.social: We are all Mrs Dalloway now

Really pleased to be in today among several writers I admire and plenty of Addison Rae!

Get your pens out for the lads, all the young dudes are back in town and time, I've piled in on literary man! Read six really charming new novels for this. A rich few weeks of inner life. Link below: Revenge of the Young Male Novelist www.newstatesman.com/culture/book...

"However greatly exaggerated the death (or murder, or suicide) of literary man has been, for two months at least it seems all the young dudes are back in town." 📕 @georgemonaghan.bsky.social: The revenge of the young male novelist

“There is no surer foundation for a beautiful friendship than a mutual taste in literature.” ― P.G. Wodehouse

To be an everyman without being a nothingman is quite something, man. As new episodes of Clarkson's Farm come out today, a reflection in the NS on the complicated sunset of Jeremy Clarkson:

So pleased to be listed, for my first time ever, on Arts & Letters Daily! It's a great day

“It’s been the work of many hands and many years to create this crisis, and it will be the work of many hands and many years to undo it.” 🗣️ @georgemonaghan.bsky.social meets Robert Macfarlane

I loved meeting @robgmacfarlane.bsky.social for the @newstatesman.com's weeekend interview TW: man-eating carps

"No one agrees with Nick. Not anymore. Cleggmania ended not with an assassination, but by self-slaughter." 🖊️ @georgemonaghan.bsky.social‬: Can you ever forgive Nick Clegg?

Here goes folks the The Booker Prizes International Booker Prize 2025 shortlist, for novels translated to English, ranked! Even if the 'actual prize' is being awarded on Tuesday and I'm not invited...

This, published yesterday, remains a lazy and cheap innuendo

Keats dies at 25. Fitzgerald starts writing Gatsby at 27. The narrator calls 26 the first year 'too old to lie to myself and call it honor'.

Uh oh haha

The landscape of contemporary masculinity – sex-obsessed and porn-addled – is not one Gareth Southgate can speak to. 🖊️ @georgemonaghan.bsky.social

I went to see a new singer called Gracie Abrams at the O2 last night

I staggered my invitations to Rye so it wouldn't be awkward if too many people said yes. Then literally no one wanted to go. Oh well I wasn't alone - Henry James was with me!

So pleased to have my meeting with Andrew Roberts out as the special thirtieth issue of my newsletter! peaceableland.substack.com/p/pl30-a-cer...

Orwell is not Saint George! A cold early rise and a fairly abject ‘sorry but could you take a photo of me with this statue’ on Sunday morning for the sake of this post, but pleased it's out and was today listed on RealClearBooks.

This week's cover: Messiah Complex A special issue on the second coming of Donald Trump, featuring Tina Brown, Jason Cowley, Thomas Piketty & Michael Sandel. Plus: - The fragile future of the Middle East - Prince Harry vs Murdoch - Who owns London? - Gatsby at 100

Orwell is not Saint George! A cold early rise and a fairly abject ‘sorry but could you take a photo of me with this statue’ on Sunday morning for the sake of this post, but pleased it's out and was today listed on RealClearBooks.

The realest moments might be those we will always remember. But they might be those we never will at all. Or so I groped, at least, in this weekend’s PL. peaceableland.substack.com/p/peaceable-...

So pleased to be on the front page of my fav mag on my fav day! Merry xmas everybody :)

So pleased to have this out! I love these films and I love Christmas!

James Salter’s machismo myth The all-action American novelist is praised for his virile heroics – but it was his instinct for “the feminine” that gave his books beauty and depth. By @georgemonaghan.bsky.social www.newstatesman.com/culture/book...