Philip Hensher

London

Professor of Creative Writing and Contributor at The Spectator

Author of novels, including To Battersea Park. Prof of Creative Writing at Bath Spa University. Comes with Schnauzer. Views personal.

Articles

‘Too bohemian for Bournemouth’: the young Lawrence Durrell

4 days ago | spectator.co.uk | Philip Hensher

These legendary lives need the clutter cleared away from them occasionally. Lawrence Durrell and his brother Gerald turned their family’s prewar escape to an untouched Corfu into a myth that supplied millions of fantasies. It still bore retelling and extravagant expansion recently, if the success of ITV’s series The Durrells is any sign. (One indication of that pleasant teatime diversion’s accuracy: the actor playing Larry, Josh O’Connor, is 6ft 2in.
A.C. Benson enters the pantheon of great English diarists

2 weeks ago | spectator.com.au | Philip Hensher

The Benson Diary: Volume I: 1885-1906; Volume II:1907-1925 Pallas Athene, pp.1050, 60 All great diarists have something intensely silly about them: Boswell’s and Pepys’s periodic bursts of lechery and panic; Chips Channon’s unrealistic dreams of political greatness leavened with breathless excitement over royal dukes and handsome boys; Alan Clark’s fits of romantic, almost Jacobite, dreaming; James Lees-Milne’s absurd flights of rage.
A.C. Benson enters the pantheon of great English diarists

2 weeks ago | spectator.co.uk | Philip Hensher

All great diarists have something intensely silly about them: Boswell’s and Pepys’s periodic bursts of lechery and panic; Chips Channon’s unrealistic dreams of political greatness leavened with breathless excitement over royal dukes and handsome boys; Alan Clark’s fits of romantic, almost Jacobite, dreaming; James Lees-Milne’s absurd flights of rage.
Spare us from ‘experimental’ novels

3 weeks ago | spectator.com.au | Philip Hensher

Some sorts of books and dramas have very strict rules. We like a lot of things to be absolutely predictable. In romantic comedies, a girl chooses between a charmer who turns out to be a rotter and another man she hates at first but then falls for. In the BBC’s long-running Casualty, if a worried patient turns up with his put-upon wife who coughs twice, it’s the wife who’s got an undiagnosed fatal disease.
What Mark Twain owed to Charles Dickens

3 weeks ago | spectator.com.au | Philip Hensher

Mark Twain Penguin Press, pp.1200, 35 You know Mark Twain’s story. You’ve got no excuse not to; there have been so many biographies. Starting in the American South as Samuel Clemens, he took his pen name from the call of the Mississippi boatmen on reaching two fathoms. His lectures, followed by his travel pieces and novels, enchanted America and then the world.
Spare us from ‘experimental’ novels

3 weeks ago | spectator.co.uk | Philip Hensher

Some sorts of books and dramas have very strict rules. We like a lot of things to be absolutely predictable. In romantic comedies, a girl chooses between a charmer who turns out to be a rotter and another man she hates at first but then falls for. In the BBC’s long-running Casualty, if a worried patient turns up with his put-upon wife who coughs twice, it’s the wife who’s got an undiagnosed fatal disease.
What Mark Twain owed to Charles Dickens

3 weeks ago | spectator.co.uk | Philip Hensher

You know Mark Twain’s story. You’ve got no excuse not to; there have been so many biographies. Starting in the American South as Samuel Clemens, he took his pen name from the call of the Mississippi boatmen on reaching two fathoms. His lectures, followed by his travel pieces and novels, enchanted America and then the world. As a southerner, his principled stance against slavery gave him moral authority.
Studying Dickens at university was once considered demeaning. Now it’s too demanding

1 month ago | spectator.co.uk | Philip Hensher

Any consideration of Stefan Collini’s subject has surely to address a major recent issue. The academic study of English, both at school and university, has fallen away significantly, with the numbers opting for it greatly diminishing.
Studying Dickens at university was once considered demeaning. Now it’s too demanding

1 month ago | spectator.com.au | Philip Hensher

Literature and Learning: A History of English Studies in Britain OUP, pp.656, 35 Any consideration of Stefan Collini’s subject has surely to address a major recent issue. The academic study of English, both at school and university, has fallen away significantly, with the numbers opting for it greatly diminishing.
Why Princess Diana is never forgotten

1 month ago | thespectator.com | Philip Hensher

What happened to the condolence books? They swiftly multiplied, that mad week in September 1997. The original four at St. James’s Palace had to be increased to more than 40. People queued for hours and often spent many minutes composing their contributions. That’s not even to mention the thousands of similar books organized by councils, embassies and private businesses. The official set were “offered” to the Spencer family. Perhaps they are at Althorp.