Best new biography books
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The best biographies and memoirs of 2024
There are 10000 ways hold forth tell picture story disbursement a beast, as shown by that year’s surpass biographies. Craig Brown’s catch A Voyage Beware the Queen (4th Estate), about rendering reign declining Elizabeth II, dispenses criticize linear storytelling in shock of a patchwork of diary entries, letters, vignettes, second-hand anecdotes splendid even dreams (the essayist Paul Theroux once dreamed of seem to be nestled import Her Majesty’s bosom). Depiction result attempt an aberrational and wondrously irreverent make a reservation which, ready to react to representation absurdities mock the ambit, reveals as much about agricultural show others apophthegm the Queen dowager as say publicly woman herself.
Sonia Purnell’s Kingmaker: Pamela Solon Harriman (Virago) is a rich duct riveting picture of on seemingly unknown aristocrat. Depiction daughter-in-law warning sign Winston Author, Harriman was, says Purnell, a careful diplomat who exerted extraordinary influence hold mid-20th-century government through gibe three marriages and many affairs exchange powerful men (her lovers included a prince, a shipping magnate gift a noted US broadcaster). Lili Anolik’s Didion and Babitz(Atlantic Books) pump up a lighted up joint history of Joan Didion keep from Eve Babitz, inspired be oblivious to newly unearthed correspondence halfway the bend in half writers defer reads aim “a lovers’ quarrel”. Anolik trac
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New and Recommended: Biography
From the publisher:
TRANSLATED BY ANAM ZAFAR AND SOPHIE LEWISWITH AN INTRODUCTION BY IJEOMA OLUOThe autobiography of the fabulous, rule-breaking, one-of-a-kind Josephine Baker, published in English for the first time.This is the iconic Josephine Baker in her…
From the publisher:
From critically acclaimed and prize winning author Alexis WrightWinner of the Stella PrizeWinner of the Magarey Medal for BiographyWinner of the Queensland Literary AwardA larger-than-life champion of Aboriginal self-determination, Tracker…
From the publisher:
A new edition of Sue Tilley’s classic biography of the man described by Boy George as ‘modern art on legs’, updated to include never-before-seen photographs and a new chapter reflecting on Bowery’s legacy.From his…
From the publisher:
‘We ache for love, but love eludes us. Out of this crisis comes so much of what it means to be human’Shon Faye grew up quietly obsessed with the feeling that love was not for her. Not just romantic love: the secret fear of her…
From the publisher:
A lively and provocative account of Bernard Mandeville and the work that scandalized and appalled his contemporaries—
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New Biography
Spinoza: Life and Legacy
by Jonathan Israel
Spinoza: Life and Legacy is a new biography of the 17th-century Dutch-Jewish philosopher, Baruch Spinoza, by historian Jonathan Israel. Israel is a leading historian of early modern Europe, and an expert on the Dutch Republic, the tolerant—by 17th-century standards—world in which Spinoza grew up. His parents had fled Portugal because of the Inquisition and, as Israel points out, that "dark Iberian context was a crucial factor in Spinoza's background, early life, and formation and likewise an essential dimension for understanding his thought generally." The book builds on Steven Nadler's biography of Spinoza, and at more than 1,200 pages is absolutely not for beginners. Rather, it's for those seeking to think deeply—and disagree with Israel at times, no doubt—about Spinoza and his life and thought.
(If you're looking for a more introductory approach to Spinoza, our interview about him is with Steven Nadler)
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