Backlisted

In a special edition recorded earlier this year live at the Durham Book Festival, John and Andy are joined by writers Adele Stripe and Ben Myers to discuss Gordon Burn's debut novel Alma Cogan. The 'What Have We Been Reading?' slots are occupied by Pevsner's guide to Durham and The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro * To purchase any of the books mentioned in this episode please visit our bookshop at uk.bookshop.org/shop/backlisted where all profits help to sustain this podcast and UK independent bookshops. *If you'd like to support the show, join in with the book chat, listen without adverts, receive the show early and get extra bonus fortnightly episodes, become a patron at www.patreon.com/backlisted Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Recorded back in 2017, John and Andy were joined by poet, radio presenter, playwright and genuine tyke Ian McMillan to discuss Malcolm Lowry's 1947 masterwork, Under The Volcano. Also, The Factory of Light by Michael Jacobs, and more Rosemary Tonks. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Joining John and Andy in this episode are multiple returnees and Official Friends of Backlisted: Dr Una McComack and Andrew Male. The book they are here to talk about is The Inheritors by William Golding, his second published novel (after Lord of the Flies) and first released by Faber & Faber in 1955. And it is one of the titles on the list Andy and John made when they first met to talk about Backlisted and the kind of books they’d like to feature. This episode also features Andy enjoying Square Haunting by Francesca Wade and John highlights a new poetry anthology from Bloodaxe Books called Staying Human. This show was recorded back in June 2020 and is a rerun. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dr Rowan Williams, theologian, poet and former Archbishop of Canterbury, joins Andy and John for a thoughtful and moving discussion of Till We Have Faces (1956), the last novel by C.S. Lewis. This episode was recorded in London in June 2025. Although not as well-reviewed as his previous work, C.S. Lewis believed Till We Have Faces to be "far and away my best book". Over the 70 years since publication, critical opinion has risen in line with the author's estimation. The book shows a more troubled, less dogmatic side to Lewis that that displayed in The Case for Christianity or, for that matter, The Chronicles of Narnia. The novel is a retelling of the myth of Cupid and Psyche, a story that haunted Lewis ever since he was an undergraduate. It is an endlessly fascinating text that cannot be pinned down easily, and we were very fortunate to be able to discuss it with Rowan Williams, who has a lifetime of experience reading Lewis, and this book in particular. We hope you get as much from the conversation, and from reading the novel, as we have. * To purchase any of the books mentioned in this episode please visit our bookshop at uk.bookshop.org/shop/backlisted where all profits help to sustain this podcast and UK independent bookshops. * For information about everything mentioned in this episode visit www.backlisted.fm *If you'd like to support the show and join in with the book chat, listen without adverts, receive the show early and with extra bonus fortnightly episodes and exclusive writing, become a Patreon at www.patreon.com/backlisted *You can sign up to our free monthly newsletter here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ian Patterson, author of Books: A Manifesto , returns to Backlisted for a joyful discussion of Iris Murdoch and her sixteenth novel The Sacred and Profane Love Machine (1974), the winner of the Whitbread literary award for fiction. For reasons that will be obvious, the talk soon turns to other novels by Murdoch, including The Bell (1958), The Black Prince (1973), The Sea, the Sea (1978) and The Green Knight (1993), plus the film adaptations of A Severed Head (1961) and the unknown book that spawned erotic thriller Love Standing Up (1985). We listen to interview clips from the archive and excerpts from her remarkable and prescient speech ‘Art and Tyranny’ (1972). The author was considered to be a literary titan in her lifetime. But where does her reputation stand in 2026? Was Murdoch a philosopher who wrote novels, a novelist who wrote philosophy, a pioneer of wild swimming, or a unique combination of the three? This is a playful and wide-ranging conversation between Ian, Una, Andy and Nicky, with articulate individuals exchanging sophisticated ideas in a manner similar to, yet entirely unlike, characters in an Iris Murdoch novel. We hope you enjoy it just as much as we did. *For £150 off any Serious Readers HD Light and free UK delivery use the discount code: BACK at seriousreaders.com/backlisted * To purchase any of the books mentioned in this episode please visit our bookshop at uk.bookshop.org/shop/backlisted where all profits help to sustain this podcast and UK independent bookshops. * For information about everything mentioned in this episode visit www.backlisted.fm *If you'd like to support the show and join in with the book chat, listen without adverts, receive the show early and get extra bonus fortnightly episodes and original writing, become a patron at www.patreon.com/backlisted Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Biographer and singer-songwriter Paul Thompson joins us for a new episode of Backlisted devoted to the life and work of Jake Thackray, the so-called 'Yorkshire chansonnier' who died in 2002. Thackray was a man of many talents, as demonstrated by Jake Thackray: The Unsung Writer, a new anthology of his prose and poetry. We invited our friend and fellow fan Andrew Male to join us for a discussion of the teacher from Leeds who lionised Georges Brassens when few outside the French-speaking world had heard of him, and who became famous in the 1960s and 1970s for his numerous TV appearances on shows such as Braden's Week and That's Life, but who later in life sought and achieved near-total obscurity. *For £150 off any Serious Readers HD Light and free UK delivery use the discount code: BACK at seriousreaders.com/backlisted * To purchase any of the books mentioned in this episode please visit our bookshop at uk.bookshop.org/shop/backlisted where all profits help to sustain this podcast and UK independent bookshops. * For information about everything mentioned in this episode visit www.backlisted.fm *If you'd like to support the show and join in with the book chat, listen without adverts, receive the show early and get extra bonus fortnightly episodes and original writing, become a patron at www.patreon.com/backlisted *You can sign up to our free monthly newsletter here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Merry Christmas! Join Andy and Una, plus authors Louie Stowell and Robert Shearman, for a post-solstice celebration of Asterix and the Roman Agent (1972) by René Goscinny (words) and Albert Uderzo (pictures), first published in France in 1970 as La Zizanie, and freely translated into English by Anthea Bell and Derek Hockridge. Christmas was a festival unknown to the residents of the little Gaulish village, whose adventures took place circa 50 BC. Few childhood Christmases of the 1970s and 80s were complete, however, without one or more Asterix adventures under the tree, so we do our best to mention every single one in this episode. We hear an archive interview with Goscinny and Uderzo themselves, and delve into the history behind the history of one the most successful comic strips in history. In addition, this is probably the most visual episode of Backlisted to date, so it's just as well we filmed it - the video is available on YouTube, and contains all manner of special treats. May we take this opportunity to thank you for your support in 2025, by Toutatis, and wish you all a magic potion-fuelled Christmas and New Year. *For £150 off any Serious Readers HD Light and free UK delivery use the discount code: BACK at seriousreaders.com/backlisted * To purchase any of the books mentioned in this episode please visit our bookshop at uk.bookshop.org/shop/backlisted where all profits help to sustain this podcast and UK independent bookshops. * For information about everything mentioned in this episode visit www.backlisted.fm *If you'd like to support the show and join in with the book chat, listen without adverts, receive the show early and get extra bonus fortnightly episodes and original writing, become a patron at www.patreon.com/backlisted *You can sign up to our free monthly newsletter here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A timely revisit of our 2022 Christmas special which celebrates Ballet Shoes by Noel Streatfeild, a classic of children’s literature and the childhood favourite of our producer, Nicky Birch. We are joined by the writer Una McCormack and Tanya Kirk, the Lead Curator of Printed Heritage Collections (1601-1900) at the British Library, who are both lifetime Streatfeild fans. Ballet Shoes was an immediate bestseller upon publication and the runner-up for the inaugural Carnegie Medal. It has never been out of print and was the first in a series of ‘Shoes’ books by Streatfeild. It has been adapted many times both as an audiobook and for film and television and in 2019 BBC News included Ballet Shoes on its list of the 100 most influential novels of all time. We discuss why this might be the case and much more besides and even hear from Miss Streatfeild herself. And it being a Christmas episode, there is a fiendish festive quiz. We also feature two other classic books by writers best known through their writing for children. John discusses The Giant under the Snow by John Gordon, an eerie Puffin classic from 1968, while Andy revels in the darkness of John Christopher’s The Death of Grass, first published in 1956, a post-apocalyptic science fiction novel, definitely written for adults and perfect for cutting through your post-lunch torpor. Enjoy! *For £150 off any Serious Readers HD Light and free UK delivery use the discount code: BACK at seriousreaders.com/backlisted * To purchase any of the books mentioned in this episode please visit our bookshop at uk.bookshop.org/shop/backlisted where all profits help to sustain this podcast and UK independent bookshops. * For information about everything mentioned in this episode visit www.backlisted.fm *If you'd like to support the show and join in with the book chat, listen without adverts, receive the show early and get extra bonus fortnightly episodes and original writing, become a patron at www.patreon.com/backlisted *You can sign up to our free monthly newsletter here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Writer and critic Matthew De Abaitua joins Andy, Una and Nicky to discuss Last and First Men: A Story of the Near and Far Future (1930), the astounding first novel by Olaf Stapledon. The book is one of the founding texts of science fiction, a fact that has both assured its reputation and arguably restricted its readership, a conundrum we discuss during the show; certainly, few novels are so vast in scope or present the reader with such leaps of the imagination. Whatever you think you know about genre tropes, futurology and how best to tell a story, prepare to have your preconceptions shot out of the pod bay doors, pal. Comparisons between Last and First Men and 2001: A Space Odyssey are justifiable, not least because Kubrick's film was adapted from a story by Arthur C. Clarke, an author who said of Stapledon's novel, "no other book had a greater influence on my life". Why isn't such a 'corking good writer' (C.S. Lewis), feted in his time by Jorge Luis Borges, Virginia Woolf and Winston Churchill, more widely known today? And would it be correct to identify Olaf Stapledon, who projected his consciousness across the universe from his back garden on the Wirral, as the original Cosmic Scouser? Listen to find out. *Stapledon's archive is held at the Science Fiction Hub at Liverpool University - some of which you can view here. *For £150 off any Serious Readers HD Light and free UK delivery use the discount code: BACK at seriousreaders.com/backlisted * To purchase any of the books mentioned in this episode please visit our bookshop at uk.bookshop.org/shop/backlisted where all profits help to sustain this podcast and UK independent bookshops. * For information about everything mentioned in this episode visit www.backlisted.fm *If you'd like to support the show and join in with the book chat, listen without adverts, receive the show early and get extra bonus fortnightly episodes and original writing, become a patron at www.patreon.com/backlisted Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Something a little different this week. Andy, Una and Nicky discuss the novel Transit by Rachel Cusk, the second part of her award-winning Outline trilogy. Outline, the first volume was published in 2014, with Transit following two years later and then finally Kudos in 2018; our conversation encompasses all three books. Backlisted began not long after Outline was published, and in the time we’ve been on air, the novels have gone from being well-reviewed new titles to bestsellers to backlist classics. When the history of early 21st-century literature is written, Rachel Cusk may well be cited as the figure responsible for taking the genre of autofiction into the mainstream. All three of us have a distinctly different relationship to these novels and we thought it might be illuminating to spend a hour or so comparing notes. Good news: it was! We hope you enjoy listening to us talking about reading books about people talking about writing books about people talking about books, as much as we enjoyed talking about them. *For £150 off any Serious Readers HD Light and free UK delivery use the discount code: BACK at seriousreaders.com/backlisted * To purchase any of the books mentioned in this episode please visit our bookshop at uk.bookshop.org/shop/backlisted where all profits help to sustain this podcast and UK independent bookshops. * For information about everything mentioned in this episode visit www.backlisted.fm *If you'd like to support the show and join in with the book chat, listen without adverts, receive the show early and get extra bonus fortnightly episodes and original writing, become a patron at www.patreon.com/backlisted *You can sign up to our free monthly newsletter here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

For this year's Halloween episode, we take a windswept walk across the Yorkshire moors with Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights — not as a tale of doomed romance, but as a novel steeped in gothic horror, mystery and the supernatural. With our resident spooky authorities, Andrew Male and Laura Varnam, we explore the book’s darker undercurrents, ghostly visitations, and the uncanny wildness of Brontë’s imagination. There's also lots of Brontë backstory - so whether you're a lifelong devotee or only know it from Kate Bush and damp film adaptations, please join us for our Halloween special.And, yes we do cover the only question that really matters: who’s your favourite Brontë? *For £150 off any Serious Readers HD Light and free UK delivery use the discount code: BACK at seriousreaders.com/backlisted * To purchase any of the books mentioned in this episode please visit our bookshop at uk.bookshop.org/shop/backlisted where all profits help to sustain this podcast and UK independent bookshops. * For information about everything mentioned in this episode visit www.backlisted.fm *If you'd like to support the show and join in with the book chat, listen without adverts, receive the show early and get extra bonus fortnightly episodes and original writing, become a patron at www.patreon.com/backlisted *You can sign up to our free monthly newsletter here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

To honour the life of Jilly Cooper, we are replaying this joyous episode from 2019 with a new introduction. Joining Andy and John in this episode are Daisy Buchanan, writer, feminist, host of the brilliant You’re Booked podcast. Daisy’s latest book Read Yourself Happy - How to Use Books to Ease Your Anxiety is published by Dorling Kindersley. She is joined by Dr. Ian Patterson, a poet and retired academic who taught English for 20 years at Queens’ College, Cambridge. Ian has just written Books, A Manifesto or, How To Build A Library which is published by Orion. The main book under discussion is is Imogen by Jilly Cooper, first published by Arlington Books in 1978, the fifth in her now legendary series of 7 ‘romances’ published between 1975 and 1981. Also in this episode, Andy overcomes his horror of football to praise J.L. Carr’s 1975 classic How Steeple Sinderby Wanderers Won the F.A. Cup while John toasts the memory of the great children’s author and illustrator, John Burningham. *For £150 off any Serious Readers HD Light and free UK delivery use the discount code: BACK at seriousreaders.com/backlisted *We will be appearing live in NYC on Mon 27th Oct 2025 at 92NY and on Weds Oct 29th 2025 at The Bitter End - come and say hello. * To purchase any of the books mentioned in this episode please visit our bookshop at uk.bookshop.org/shop/backlisted where all profits help to sustain this podcast and UK independent bookshops. * For information about everything mentioned in this episode visit www.backlisted.fm *If you'd like to support the show and join in with the book chat, listen without adverts, receive the show early and with extra bonus fortnightly episodes and exclusive writing, become a Patreon at www.patreon.com/backlisted *You can sign up to our free monthly newsletter here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Writer Jason Hazeley joins Andy, Una and Nicky for a celebratory investigation - or investigative celebration - of All the Devils Are Here, the ungovernable literary brainchild of the late David Seabrook and a book we first discussed on Backlisted in April 2016. (You can still find episode 11, which featured critic Rachel Cooke, in the usual places.) This extraordinary work of non-fiction was republished in the wake of our show, since which time it has gone on to find a whole new audience of readers, captivated and baffled in equal measure by its creeping, seething brilliance. In other words, Backlisted literally gave new life to an old book, and as a result it continues to haunt the streets of Rochester, Margate et al, taking notes and muttering to itself, before catching a bus back to Canterbury. What more have we learned about David Seabrook since All the Devils Are Here last featured on the podcast? What exactly do we mean when we describe the book as sui generis and a law unto itself? And just what is Kent's problem? Good luck, everyone! On Mon 27th Oct 2025, Backlisted is recording a show at 92NY in New York, on William Maxwell at the New Yorker. Tickets are available now from https://www.92ny.org On Wed 29th Oct 2025, we will be at the Bitter End in Greenwich Village, NYC, recording a special episode on books by Bob Dylan, including Tarantula and Chronicles Vol. 1. Tickets are available now from www.bitterend.com* To purchase any of the books mentioned in this episode please visit our bookshop at uk.bookshop.org/shop/backlisted where all profits help to sustain this podcast and UK independent bookshops. * For information about everything mentioned in this episode visit www.backlisted.fm *If you'd like to support the show and join in with the book chat, listen without adverts, receive the show early and with extra bonus fortnightly episodes and exclusive writing, become a Patreon at www.patreon.com/backlisted *You can sign up to our free monthly newsletter here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Emmy Award-winning writer David Quantick (Veep, The Thick of It) joins Andy and Una for a discussion of Marc Behm's surreal thriller The Eye of the Beholder (1980). David last appeared on Backlisted almost ten years ago, waaay back on episode 5. On that occasion he brought with him Christie Malry's Own Double-Entry by B.S. Johnson. It is no exaggeration to say The Eye of the Beholder gives that novel a run for its money in terms of sheer audacity, originality and mystery. Marc Behm himself was hardly less enigmatic. He won an Oscar for his screenplay for Stanley Donen's film Charade, starring Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn; in 1965 he co-wrote the Beatles' second feature film Help! As a novelist, he was hugely popular in France, while remaining virtually unknown in America and the UK. We take a close look at The Eye of the Beholder and the long view of his remarkable and unique career. On Mon 27th Oct 2025, Backlisted is recording a show at 92NY in New York, on William Maxwell at the New Yorker. Tickets are available now from ⁠⁠https://www.92ny.org⁠⁠. On Wed 29th Oct 2025, we will be at the Bitter End in Greenwich Village, NYC, recording a special episode on books by Bob Dylan, including Tarantula and Chronicles Vol. 1. Tickets are available now from ⁠⁠https://bitterend.com⁠⁠. * To purchase any of the books mentioned in this episode please visit our bookshop at ⁠⁠uk.bookshop.org/shop/backlisted⁠⁠ where all profits help to sustain this podcast and UK independent bookshops. * For information about everything mentioned in this episode visit ⁠⁠www.backlisted.fm⁠⁠ *If you'd like to support the show and join in with the book chat, listen without adverts, receive the show early and with extra bonus fortnightly episodes and exclusive writing, become a Patreon at ⁠⁠www.patreon.com/backlisted⁠⁠ *You can sign up to our free monthly newsletter ⁠⁠here⁠⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Tombs of Atuan (1971), the second Earthsea novel, is the subject of this episode. Joining Una and Andy is writer Frank Cottrell-Boyce, current Children’s Laureate. We look at how Le Guin shifts her story from the adventures of Ged in A Wizard of Earthsea to the inner life of Tenar, a girl taken to serve as High Priestess in the labyrinthine tombs. We also consider why, despite her achievements, Le Guin is not more widely known today, and yet her work has clearly shaped generations of readers. On Mon 27th Oct 2025, Backlisted is recording a show at 92NY in New York, on William Maxwell at the New Yorker. Tickets are available now from https://www.92ny.org. On Wed 29th Oct 2025, we will be at the Bitter End in Greenwich Village, NYC, recording a special episode on books by Bob Dylan, including Tarantula and Chronicles Vol. 1. Tickets are available now from https://bitterend.com. * To purchase any of the books mentioned in this episode please visit our bookshop at uk.bookshop.org/shop/backlisted where all profits help to sustain this podcast and UK independent bookshops. * For information about everything mentioned in this episode visit www.backlisted.fm *If you'd like to support the show and join in with the book chat, listen without adverts, receive the show early and with extra bonus fortnightly episodes and exclusive writing, become a Patreon at www.patreon.com/backlisted *You can sign up to our free monthly newsletter here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Leonora Carrington's charming and surreal novel The Hearing Trumpet (1976, probably) is the subject of this episode. Joining Una, Andy and Nicky is author and lecturer Dr Paul March-Russell, who offers insights into all aspects of Carrington's career. Leonora Carrington lived a long and extraordinary life; we discuss the ways in which her biography intersects not just with her books, but her remarkable paintings and sculptures, which at auction now fetch tens of millions of dollars. How did the daughter of a Lancashire industrialist become first a muse to the Surrealists, and then an artist in her own right, whose visionary work will probably outlast theirs? How did the many challenges she faced - institutional, sexist, financial and health - shape her writing? And why, as Paul suggets, is Leonora Carrington so relevant to young artists today? Point your hearing trumpets at wherever you get your podcasts. On Mon 27th Oct 2025, Backlisted is recording a show at 92NY in New York, on William Maxwell at the New Yorker. Tickets are available now from https://www.92ny.org. On Wed 29th Oct 2025, we are recording a second show at the Bitter End in Greenwich Village, NYC, a special episode on books by Bob Dylan, including Tarantula and Chronicles Vol. 1. Tickets are available now from https://bitterend.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dave Haslam and Melanie Williams join us to discuss A Taste of Honey (1958), Shelagh Delaney's first play, written and produced when the author was not yet 20 years old. To describe this as an expert panel would be an understatement: Dave Haslam is a former resident DJ at the legendary Haçienda club in Manchester and the author of Manchester, England: The Story of the Pop Cult City; Melanie Williams is a professor of film studies at UEA whose most recent book was the BFI monograph on the big screen adaptation of A Taste of Honey (1961). How did a Salford teenager change the face of British theatre? Nearly 70 years on, why do the play's themes and characters continue to resonate in the 21st century? And what did Shelagh Delaney do for an encore (and why do so few people know about it)? This show will open your eyes. On 27th Oct 2025 Backlisted is recording a show at 92NY in New York, on William Maxwell at the New Yorker. Tickets are available now from https://www.92ny.org. To purchase any of the books mentioned in this episode please visit our bookshop at uk.bookshop.org/shop/backlisted where all profits help to sustain this podcast and UK independent bookshops For information about everything mentioned in this episode visit www.backlisted.fm If you'd like to support the show and join in with the book chat, listen without adverts, receive the show early and with extra bonus fortnightly episodes and exclusive writing, become a Patreon at www.patreon.com/backlisted You can sign up to our free monthly newsletter here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices