Olivia Laing

3 weeks ago | msn.com | Olivia Laing

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3 weeks ago | theguardian.com | Olivia Laing

Muriel Spark, born Muriel Sarah Camberg, was nothing if not protean. Her gravestone declares her a poet; posterity knows her as the author of 22 short, indelibly strange and subversive novels. In life, she was by turns an editor, critic, biographer, playwright, Jewish Gentile, Catholic convert, divorcee, abandoning mother, spy. As Frances Wilson observes in this canny biography, she looks in every photograph as if she is played by a different actor, so drastic are the changes in her face and style.

1 month ago | faz.net | Olivia Laing

Ich hatte eine Lungenentzündung, also habe ich in letzter Zeit viel gelesen. Wenn man krank ist, wünscht man sich ein dickes Buch, in dem man sich verliert. Glücklicherweise hatte ich vor ein paar Jahren „Auf der Suche nach der verlorenen Zeit“ angefangen. Ich habe die einzelnen Bände schnell gelesen, aber große Pausen dazwischen gelassen. Jetzt las ich also „Guermantes“, den dritten Band.

Mar 12, 2025 | igluu.es | Olivia Laing

El 17 de agosto anunciaron la prohibición del uso de mangueras. Yo había dejado de usarla hacía varias semanas. No soportaba regar el jardín, considerar que mi trozo de tierra era más importante que cualquier otro, y tampoco soportaba ver morir a mis preciadas plantas.

Feb 28, 2025 | waterstones.com | Anna Orhanen |Olivia Laing

The Roots of The Garden Against TimeI’ve always wanted to restore a garden, ever since I first read The Secret Garden as a child. The books that I grew up on were thicketed with gardens: shaggy, mysterious, unkempt spaces in which lost or lonely children could discover marvels. My favourite was The Children of Green Knowe by Lucy M. Boston, set in a big fenland house surrounded by a wonderful, slightly sinister garden complete with walking topiary and seventeenth-century ghosts.