Granta Publications-Penguin Books USA

Leonardo's Grave ü My son was three and my daughter five. It was the summer of 1997. James Cameron's film had not yet appeared, but a great human tragedy was unfolding on our living-room carpet. 'Here it comes!' said my son to his sister, and began to push a small toy ship across the floor...

The Man with Two Heads In the course of researching the story that follows I talked to Steven Spielberg, who made the film Schindler's List. Like the novel, Schindler's Ark, on which it is based, the film used fictional devices, invented scenes and dialogue, to dramatize fact. The film was such...

Adam Mars-Jones M y mother was born on 20 August 1923 and christened Sheila Mary Felicity Cobon. At some stage she was told the supposed meaning of these names, or looked them up in a book. Her forenames meant by dérivation Blind Bitter Happiness. As an adult Sheila found this augury ruefully...

INTRODUCTION A word which should frighten more people, certainly more editors, than it does is: relaunch. Together with 'relabel', 'repackage' and 'rebrand', it smacks of marketing tradecraft, diligent attention to focus groups, flip-charts and that ritual called 'the presentation' which is...