A study has shown that the more receptive someone is to corporate jargon, the worse they are at their job - but the more likely they are to be promoted. @questingvole.bsky.social unpacks how, and why, that's the case. substack.com/inbox/post/1...

Sturgeon is fishy

Ocultar procesos inacabados bajo el mito del éxito ignora que la curación real y la biología no son lineales. Como el fenaquistiscopio del siglo XIX, que simula movimiento continuo uniendo fotogramas fijos, el cerebro crea una ilusión de estabilidad que reprime el cansancio y deforma la realidad.

Why, alas, it's impossible to mock business bollocks out of existence

On Ben Rhodes’s new book

"Ancient Tongues and Ideas about Truth" – @questingvole.bsky.social (Sam Leith) interviewing yours truly on Axess Television, on Kabbalah, Nāgārjuna and other such interesting stuff! : youtu.be/ZUucCE7MXZ0?...

Andrew and the cops

On the Commonwealth Prize AI stooshie

I reviewed a really fun slice of weird fiction

It's Sylvia Plath! With the editors of the new complete, featuring pomes about skipping and singing and stuff.

On the moral courage of Reform

Everyone’s a critic

On libraries and censorship for the Toronto Globe & Mail

On the joy of Nicholson Baker, and the good old days Of presidential assassination fantasies

On the glories of Wallace Stevens, via Stephen King

On Andrew Lloyd Webber and the bottle

Is funny.

New podcast, with Joe Sacco spectator.com/podcast/joe-...

New substack, on choosing winners and publishing losers, plus Viktor Orban's tram ticket

Will he have to take an actual dump on the White House lawn before the GOP decides all might not be right with the President?

In other news, very excited to be on this year’s Baillie Gifford panel

On London, the sharia law hellhole

Had a similar teenage horror reading arc, so this was pleasantly nostalgic. As always, this Substack is a great source for finding out about upcoming/recent books that had somehow passed me by and now need to be acquired instantly!

The horror! The horror!

‪If you could not attend nor watch the "Haunted Woods and Grimm Tales" event from March 27, with Philip Pullman and Sam Leith discussing various topics (including some rose or field considerations... but not only) with Julia Eccleshar, it is here for you to watch...

This gets to the fundamental reason why I won't use AI: if you have to check everything it says, is its value greater than your reputation?

Preston's account of his ChatGPT-plagiarism makes AI out to be a monkey's paw/evil genie, fulfilling your wish but in a way that does you far more harm than good

Why on earth would Alex Preston, a talented and experienced literary critic, risk using Ai to write a review for the notoriously nitpicky New York Times? Excellent explainer behind baffling story by @questingvole.bsky.social

I tend to agree

I wrote on AI trashing literary life, and spoke to Alex Preston about the NYT book review scandal

On MattGPT and the future of bookishness

Just watched a very informative discussion arranged by @britishlibrary.bsky.social, called Haunted Woods and Grimm Tales with @philippullman.bsky.social and @questingvole.bsky.social #ReaderSky #WriterSky

In #Aristotle’s ‘Rhetoric’, we hear of ‘Polycrates, who delivered a panegyric to the mice that gnawed through the bow strings of an invading Assyrian army.’ Sam Leith ( @questingvole.bsky.social), ‘You Talkin’ to Me? #Rhetoric from Aristotle to Obama’ p. 30.

Trump just raged at our NATO allies for refusing to help reopen the Strait of Hormuz and bail him out of the fiasco he created. He threatened to withdraw from NATO with childish insults. This is best seen as an admission of serious political weakness. 1/ (new piece) newrepublic.com/article/2080...

Kharg, a small, rocky island just off the Iranian coast, could be the Trump administration’s key to victory—or its undoing—in the Iran war, @brynntannehill.bsky.social argues.

This is really good, on Betjeman especially, who is a good poet. Suggs carries ‘On A Portrait of a Deaf Man’ in his wallet.

Another Substack. Come for Betjeman, stay for Veruca Salt

Isaac Chotiner is to the American Interview what Anton Chigurh is for asset recovery

I have put my Listener review of @questingvole.bsky.social Sam Leith's A Haunted Wood up on my website a year later in case anyone is interested and missed it the first time. www.rachael-king.com/review-the-h...

New newsletter, on why people write poetry but don’t read it, and some other bits and bobs

I can barely express how much I loathed that Hegseth Iran video, but I had a bash

New Substack: a print-out-and-keep guide to making quotation marks play nice with full stops and commas

Pissed-off Hillary is the best Hillary. I’m going to spend the next 48 hours just watching different videos of her eye-rolling Lauren Boebert. I think I’m in love.

This 'correction' from @lewisgoodall.com regarding accusations from Reform and the Conservatives that the Greens engaged in sectarianism, deserves to be widely read. #c4news

New newsletter, in which I consider stinky book reviews and overlong speeches