I’m proud to announce that ‘Wicked Baby’, my 2004 novella about the events of the Profumo Affair, is now back in print. This new edition includes an afterword, and six articles about the scandal’s lasting impact on society and popular culture. More details here.
“’My child, don’t hurry. You have eternity in front of you.’ She used to say that sarcastically, Sister Marie-Augustine, because I was so slow. But the phrase stayed with me. Soon I’ll be able to do it, but there’s no hurry. Eternity is in front of me …”
Jean Rhys, ‘Good Morning, Midnight’
“She found, however, that so far from being permitted to express her own self in this vehicle she had chosen, she was to be called upon to interpret the mostly obscure and always half-heartedly conveyed ideas of another. And more than that, these ideas, before coming under her control, had not only to pass filtrated through the whims and urgencies of the mime-master himself, but to be embarrassed and effected by the exigencies of her fellow performers.”
From ‘Twopence Coloured’ by Patrick Hamilton
“Maybe our nature makes us see the unforeseen tricks of fate as more pointless and arbitrary than they are. In a story or poem, for instance, every time the unexpected happens to fit in with something fate secretly intended, we accuse the writer of being novelettish. And in real life, too, unforeseen events that in themselves are natural and simple appear to us, just because of the way we happen to feel at that particular moment, extraordinary or downright supernatural.”
Elsa Morante, ‘Arturo’s Island’
“Even things about her that were irrevocably ugly now seemed to me uniquely, matchlessly beautiful. What’s more, I was sure that if by some future miracle her ugliness was suddenly transformed into perfection, her looks wouldn’t improve - on the contrary, I’d always regret the change. That was how beautiful I thought her. I thought everyone else must feel just as I did; in fact, I felt this so strongly that the simplest greeting, the most ordinary words addressed to her, seemed to me reverent homage, signs of adoration.”
- Elsa Morante, ‘Arturo’s Island’
“I think it’s just elegant to have an imagination. I just have no imagination at all. I have lots of other things, but I have no imagination.”
Marilyn Monroe as ‘The Girl’ in The Seven Year Itch (1955), photographed by Elliott Erwitt
“It never was about the money or the drugs
For you, there’s only love
For you, there’s only love
It never was about the party or the clubs
For you, there’s only love…”
Lana Del Rey. ‘Religion’
“Sometimes in the silent apartment I stopped, I thought that perhaps at that moment Lila, too, was awake, maybe she was writing like me, maybe summarising texts that she’d read in the library, maybe putting down her reflections, maybe she moved on from there to recount episodes of her own, maybe the historic truth didn’t interest her, she sought only starting points from which to let imagination wander.” - Elena Ferrante, ‘The Story of the Lost Child’
“The true story is finally told about Jeanne Eagels, legendary Broadway star as Sadie Thompson in Somerset Maugham’s 'Rain’, celebrated silent movie actress, and Academy Award-nominated superstar in 'The Letter’. She lived a life of renown, yet her rise to fame, her romances, her triumphs, her relentless perfectionism, and her fragile health propelled her into increasingly erratic behavior and a shocking climax that stunned the entire world. Illustrated with nearly 150 rare and unseen photographs.”
“You’ve got to have something to eat and a little love in your life before you can hold still for any damn body’s sermon on how to behave.” - Billie Holiday