Kathryn Bromwich

Rory MacLean’s grief memoir and travelogue follows his search for spiritual meaning during the five years after his wife Katrin’s death, taking him from Jerusalem and India to Bhutan, South Dakota, South Africa and Peru. The book’s vivid accounts of rituals, landscapes and dangerous journeys demonstrate MacLean’s considerable travel-writing skills, while its discussions of Victorian spiritualism and AI-assisted grieving are judged thoughtful. However, the review criticizes his grandiloquent prose, reliance on numerology and ambiguous supernatural experiences, uneven tone, outdated descriptions of minority groups and excessive attention to women’s appearances. MacLean ultimately concludes that the journey matters more than finding a definitive afterlife.

Daisy Lafarge explains how severe pain, Ehlers-Danlos syndrome and debilitating fatigue led her to create watercolours using inexpensive materials and remnants of kinesiology tape. The paintings, accompanied by poems inspired by William Blake and The Romance of the Rose, form part of the We Contain Multitudes exhibition at Dundee Contemporary Arts Centre. Lafarge hopes the work will challenge assumptions about disabled artists while resisting the idea that disability should be treated as a separate identity. She also criticizes the lack of specialist NHS provision in Scotland, the burdensome process of applying for disability benefits and Labour’s welfare cuts, arguing that symbolic representation has little meaning without material support.

Sophie Pinkham’s book argues that Russia’s vast forests are central to understanding the country’s national identity, history, politics, society and literature. The review describes how forests have alternately served as sources of wealth, military advantage, resistance and ideological symbolism, while tracing their treatment in Russian writing and indigenous traditions. It praises Pinkham’s evocative prose and the book’s ambitious argument, but finds its structure sprawling, occasionally jarring and repetitive. The forest’s resilience amid war, deforestation, nuclear disaster and climate change provides the book’s ultimately hopeful wider implication.

Northern Exposure, the warm and unconventional 1990–95 drama set in rural Alaska, is being rediscovered after becoming available on Prime Video in 2024 following years of limited access caused largely by music-rights problems. Stars Rob Morrow and Janine Turner have launched the Northern Disclosure podcast to revisit all 110 episodes. The series is praised for its inventive writing, intellectual ambition, inclusive depiction of LGBTQ+ and Native American characters, and influence on later television, although some elements have aged poorly. Its renewed popularity reflects both its enduring emotional impact and its ability to introduce a new generation to its vision of acceptance, community and peaceful coexistence.

Horror cinema continues to associate disability, disfigurement, neurodivergence and mental illness with monstrosity, violence or unease, even when films claim that moral evil lies in the supposedly normal character. Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein is criticized for casting an able-bodied actor as its disabled-coded creature and making Victor Frankenstein increasingly disabled to signal his corruption. The essay also highlights subtler uses of disabled bodies and prosthetics as atmospheric horror devices in acclaimed films. Bromwich argues that human behaviour is more frightening than physical difference and praises films such as Bring Her Back for casting a disabled actor in a complex role without making disability itself a source of fear. Greater representation of disabled writers, directors and performers is presented as the key to achieving more authentic storytelling.

Kate Nash discusses her new single “Germ,” which criticizes gender-critical feminism and argues that transphobia is incompatible with feminism. She says the song was prompted by a UK Supreme Court ruling on the legal definition of woman and by her concern for trans friends facing hostility and uncertainty. Nash describes receiving support from LGBTQ+ advocates as well as misogynistic abuse from gender-critical critics, and urges cis women to defend trans rights. She also criticizes the music industry’s treatment of artists, explaining that she used OnlyFans to help fund touring and regain control over her image and sexuality after financial exploitation by a former manager.

After developing long COVID and experiencing severe chest pain when wearing bras, Kathryn Bromwich stopped wearing them during lockdown. She later replaced them with adhesive nipple covers for work, finding the alternative comfortable and practical while becoming more accepting of her body and less reliant on structured lingerie.

Romola Garai shares seven cultural highlights: Eliza Clark’s darkly comic short-story collection She’s Always Hungry; Tanztheater Wuppertal’s daring production of Vollmond at Sadler’s Wells; Sleater-Kinney’s grief-filled song “Say It Like You Mean It”; the trauma-focused television drama Yellowjackets; The Rest Is History’s episodes on the French Revolution and Marie Antoinette; Abney Park Cemetery in Stoke Newington; and Le Cottage Bise on Lake Annecy. Her recommendations reflect a strong preference for emotionally intense, historically rich and often melancholic work, alongside secluded and atmospheric places.

Kit de Waal highlights six cultural experiences and works she admires: Steve Coogan’s stage adaptation of Dr Strangelove, a rare 17th-century portrait at Compton Verney, folk musician Scott Matthews, the Paris Noir exhibition of Black artists at the Centre Pompidou, Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto No. 2 performed by candlelight, and Whitby Abbey, which she associates with Bram Stoker’s inspiration for Dracula. She connects Matthews’s song “Mona” to her second novel and emphasizes the emotional power of Rachmaninov and Brief Encounter.

A photo gallery celebrating Indigenous women from Bolivia who climb mountains.

A photo gallery showcasing Eric Kogan’s visual illusions found in everyday urban environments, with a focus on New York.

Lucy Dacus discusses Forever Is a Feeling, an intensely personal album about love, intimacy, change and the value of relationships even when they may not last. She explains her renewed focus on handmade artistic craftsmanship, criticizes AI-generated art and the commercial pressures of the music industry, and reflects on fame, intrusive fandom and her public relationship with Julien Baker. Dacus also speaks about adoption and chosen family, her complicated relationship with organized religion, support for Palestine, and fears for trans people and immigrants under Donald Trump. She says her future ambitions extend beyond music to creative work, farming and cooking.

A photo gallery documents William Morris designs appearing in everyday settings, including ceilings, clothing, wallpaper, furniture, murals and household objects across London and elsewhere. The images are credited to Christopher Everard, Beth Rees, Jo Bradford, Emma Russo, Eriko Suzuki, Kitty Malton, Rowan Bain and Jess Worth.

Georgia Ellery highlights six cultural interests: Natalie Wynn’s ContraPoints video essays, Edvard Munch’s art at Oslo’s Munch Museum, the Life of Bi podcast, Mary Gabriel’s biography Madonna: A Rebel Life, international sauna and onsen traditions, and Michaela Coel’s television work. Ellery discusses her career with Jockstrap and Black Country, New Road, her admiration for Coel and Madonna, and her enthusiasm for art, queer-focused media and restorative travel experiences.

Kathryn Bromwich argues that an AI-generated metafictional story about grief, praised by Sam Altman and Jeanette Winterson, is structurally weak, sentimental and self-satisfied, lacking the unpredictability and human creative presence that make literature meaningful. She also condemns a Department for Work and Pensions video urging disabled people into work, saying its imagery unintentionally evokes the gates of Auschwitz and reveals an alarming lack of historical awareness amid Labour’s controversial welfare cuts. The column closes on a lighter note by celebrating Whitetop, a 27-year-old North Carolina llama recognized as the oldest of its kind in captivity for his long service comforting chronically ill children.

A photo gallery showcasing artist Ted Lott’s miniature-home works from his Migration, Dwell and Carpenter Gothic series, created between 2014 and 2021.

Five years after the first Covid lockdowns, millions of people continue to experience debilitating Long Covid symptoms, including exhaustion, pain, neurological problems and organ damage. Patient accounts from Rowan Brown, Avalyn Godfrey and Sarah Matthews show how the illness can destroy careers, education, relationships and personal identity, while healthcare workers face particular difficulties returning to employment. Clinicians say the condition remains unpredictable, lacks a definitive biomarker or universally effective treatment, and is associated with major economic and mental-health consequences. The article argues that political and public discussion has moved on prematurely, obscuring Long Covid’s contribution to workforce absence and leaving patients disbelieved and unsupported. Research such as UCLH’s Stimulate-ICP trial offers hope, but continued investment, recognition of Long Covid as an occupational disease, support for disabled workers and preparedness for future pandemics are presented as essential.

A visual gallery presents Victor Hugo’s fantastical drawings of castles, fortifications and landscapes, including works created between the 1840s and 1870s. Featured pieces depict locations such as Vianden and the Casquets lighthouse, with works sourced from Maisons de Victor Hugo, Paris Musées, the British Museum and the Bibliothèque nationale de France.

A photography gallery featuring found images of women in trees.