Books

Elleke Boehmer on a refreshing argument that verse allowed its makers and readers in the empire to adjust to new settings while maintaining ties with Britain

Candida Moss lauds a volume that charts ‘lived religion’ from the Iron Age to late antiquity

There is more to this ‘misunderstood’ man than just the romantic poetry for which he is best known, writes Hetta Howes

Book of the week: Eliane Glaser on how authoritarians get an opening when party elites play with populist fires

In Hormonal, Martie Haselton writes in a style that is lively, popular and confessional, but still scientifically rigorous – a bit like chick lit with footnotes

A weekly look over the shoulders of our scholar-reviewers

Lab bench discoveries made during the 1800s were felt in the playhouse, says Matthew Broome

Emma Rees on a challenging study that leads to flashbacks of Foucault and Xena: Warrior Princess

Christopher Hill on how internal national tensions have come up against the structures of the EU

Keith Kahn-Harris on a pan-European event that is as much about competition and national identities as it is cooperation and friendship

Book of the week: Russia’s power plays with its neighbours may be tied to its lack of civic maturity, says Lara Douds

The author and professor of sociology and philosophy of law discusses Vonnegut, pre-communist histories and the EU’s present and future

A weekly look over the shoulders of our scholar-reviewers

A study of search parties pursuing minors in the rubble explores every corner, says Dan Stone

Roger Brown on a study of the implications for universities of leaving the European Union

The UK and the US have vilified this Islamic group, but both worked with it, says Madawi Al-Rasheed

As president, Trump may be less an aberration than some think, but he attracts those whose only politics is to ‘send in a wrecking ball’, writes Martin Cohen

Revolution in Ukraine; the complexities of judging; international espionage past and present; neurogastronomy; and the surprising longevity of the kibbutz

A weekly look over the shoulders of our scholar-reviewers

Book of the week: Biancamaria Fontana on a masterly defence of the values of modernity against ‘progressophobes’

Texts from China to India and elsewhere portray Christ in a different light, says Robert A. Segal

When Goebbels and Hitler targeted Los Angeles, US officials did nothing. It was left to a Jewish lawyer to spearhead the resistance, says Nathan Abrams

John Shand welcomes a timely survey of the work of a newly fashionable philosopher

This charts with scholarship and originality the final renunciation of a synergy between church and state and a shift to the sovereignty of conscience, John Cornwell writes

Book of the week: Jonathan Mirsky wonders at the wisdom of making this Asian ‘miracle’ a model for rapid development

The contributions to come from a conference held last year at the threatened Central European University and discuss why it’s so vital to defend the academy’s core values

A weekly look over the shoulders of our scholar-reviewers

A study about caring for those with dementia should be read by all who want care to improve for older people, writes Martina Zimmermann

A weekly look over the shoulders of our scholar-reviewers

Book of the week: Only once has a supreme global power peacefully ceded its reign to another, A. W. Purdue writes

Females are the ‘biological puppeteers’ driving the evolution of allure, says Simon Underdown

Flora Samuel on a study exploring the conflict that higher education institutions can cause in cities

Charlotte Jones is fascinated by an ‘experiment’ that ‘reconstructs the act of remembrance’ and brings its subjects back to life

The professor of Christian origins and Second Temple Judaism and author of ‘What Did Jesus Look Like?’ on puzzles, a chance encounter with ‘Jesus the Jew’ and 1st-century fashion

A study of divergent defiant forces omits the ‘hot and cold strangeness’ in loyalty, finds Fred Inglis

Why can’t we feed the world? Because food is a powerful weapon of war that we have done little to disable, says Tehila Sasson

In composing, Mozart focused not on ideal form but on how a piece would play, hears Nicholas Till

Leo Mellor on a work that explores a group of writers for whom questions about time, selfhood and reality led not to introspection or aesthetic withdrawal but to a desire to change the world

Book of the week: A study marries passion and wit as it takes on the enemies of the canon, says Gary Day

A weekly look over the shoulders of our scholar-reviewers

Cultural forces written on the body; rules for living; the big impact of small thefts; an insight into Edwardian archaeology in Egypt; Michael Sandel in China

Marcus Chown is won over by a graphic novel that allows readers to eavesdrop as experts discuss the big questions in science with laypeople

John Gilbey on a welcome guide to the thorny legal and ethical issues of a new technological era 

A wide-ranging and thought-provoking account of religion and spirituality in America explores how faith is articulated through the marketplace and celebrity, says Torkel Brekke

This critique details much wrong in US HE but also sketches a plan for reform, says David Wheeler

A weekly look over the shoulders of our scholar-reviewers

Book of the week: Will we swallow a radical take on a Shakespearean tragedy served with edibles? asks Peter J. Smith

Writer’s Luck: A Memoir: 1976-1991, from the author of celebrated comic campus novels and former professor of English literature, offers a vivid picture of a lost world 

A study exploring Natalie Portman’s role in Darren Aronofsky’s Black Swan and Céline Sciamma’s film Girlhood is a fascinating addition to the discipline’s output, argues Davina Quinlivan

From Hillsborough to rape victims, a study mulls the place of emotive images, says Sharon Wheeler

In this collection, cosmopolitanism is a leviathan, housing contradiction and dispute

For centrists to regain control will need more than a focus on citizenship, says Michael Marinetto

The historian and author of In Search of the Phoenicians on reading the Bible under the blankets, DIY Latin lessons and the keys to unlocking the ancient world

A weekly look over the shoulders of our scholar-reviewers

Book of the week: An intellectual property battle over two dolls puts the focus on market competition, Laura Frost finds

James Stevens Curl on an eloquent plea for an understanding of the past through built fabric

Internment in the colonies served a darker purpose beyond aid efforts, finds Laleh Khalili

Joanna Bourke muses over the motivations of those who leave home to fight in conflicts abroad. Are they terrorists or principled idealists?

How did mushrooming cities influence verse and vice versa? Shahidha Bari on a bold study

A whirlwind tour of universities, a timely survey of Iran’s past, an intriguing nose-around the Byzantine Empire, and a fascinating study of revolution in Egypt