Tom Stoppard, one of the most influential and inventive playwrights of the modern era, died on 29 November 2025 at his home in Dorset. He was 88. Born Tomáš Sträussler in 1937 in Czechoslovakia, Stoppard fled the Nazi occupation with his family as a child, eventually settling in England — a displacement that would laterContinue reading “Tom Stoppard — 1937–2025”
Category Archives: Aesthetics
The Art of Walls: A History of Wallpaper and Its Contemporary Masters
Wallpaper has always been more than decoration. It is history written on walls: a medium that reflects the tastes, technologies, and aspirations of each era. From hand-painted Chinese panoramas to William Morris florals, from mid-century geometrics to today’s avant-garde designs, wallpaper has reinvented itself countless times. To trace its story is to understand how styleContinue reading “The Art of Walls: A History of Wallpaper and Its Contemporary Masters”
Monthly Picks: The Track Star Podcast
Why You Should Be Listening to The Track Star Podcast If you love music, stories behind songs, or simply want a podcast that blends insight with entertainment, The Track Star Podcast deserves a place in your rotation. I listen to it religiously. I learn something new about music every week, and it has opened myContinue reading “Monthly Picks: The Track Star Podcast”
The Brontë Family: A Furnace of Genius on the Yorkshire Moors
Introduction There are literary families, and then there are the Brontës—six children raised in a remote parsonage on the Yorkshire moors, who transformed personal grief, imaginative play, and strict Victorian constraints into novels that altered the course of English literature. Their story is not simply about genius blooming in isolation; it is about a familyContinue reading “The Brontë Family: A Furnace of Genius on the Yorkshire Moors”
“A House That Became a Photograph”: The Stahl House, Its History, and Why Its Sale Matters Now
High above the lights of Los Angeles, a thin plane of steel and glass floats over the city grid. For more than six decades, the Stahl House — better known as Case Study House #22 — has been less a private residence than an image in the collective imagination: Julius Shulman’s famous night-time photograph ofContinue reading ““A House That Became a Photograph”: The Stahl House, Its History, and Why Its Sale Matters Now”
Great Are the Myths
I’ve just finished the novel I’ve been writing since March, and it’s now out on submission. In the meantime, I wanted to share a few sample chapters with you. A quick glimpse of the book:At its simplest, Great Are the Myths is a coming-of-age story about a girl from thirteen to twenty-three — her firstContinue reading “Great Are the Myths”
James Baldwin: Voice of Fire, Witness of a Century
James Baldwin was one of the 20th century’s most essential writers, a man whose voice carried the urgency of politics, the intimacy of confession, and the beauty of poetry. He was novelist, essayist, playwright, and activist, but above all, he was a witness: to America’s racial history, to the lives of the dispossessed, and toContinue reading “James Baldwin: Voice of Fire, Witness of a Century”
Truman Capote: A Legacy of Style and Story
Truman Capote was one of the most indelible voices of 20th-century literature. His name evokes both glittering soirées and devastating solitude, but beyond the gossip and social whirl, he was above all a craftsman: a master stylist whose sentences could shimmer with lightness or cut with precision. His legacy is not the scandals that doggedContinue reading “Truman Capote: A Legacy of Style and Story”
An Ode to Rosalía
There are artists who sing, and then there are artists who shift the air around them. Rosalía belongs firmly to the latter. She moves through sound the way a dancer moves through space—boldly, incandescently, with that exquisite balance of rigour and risk that marks a true original. To listen to her is to feel aContinue reading “An Ode to Rosalía”
Jimmy Cliff (1944–2025)
A titan of reggae, a voice of resilience, and the man who carried Jamaica to the world. Jimmy Cliff — singer, songwriter, actor, activist, and one of the towering architects of reggae — has died at the age of 81 after a seizure and complications from pneumonia. His wife, Latifa Chambers, announced his passing onContinue reading “Jimmy Cliff (1944–2025)”
My World of Interiors 