Robbie Millen
@robbiemillen.bsky.social
Literary Editor of The Times/Sunday Times. thetimes.com/culture/books
Pinned
Robbie Millen
@robbiemillen.bsky.social
· May 10
Percival Everett: Parallels between the US and 1933 Germany are frightening
The American writer, who this week won the Pulitzer prize for his novel James, says the White House under the ‘idiot’ Donald Trump is too absurd for satire
www.thetimes.com
I interviewed the Pulitzer-winning Percival Everett. He was fun and pretty punchy ...
www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
Reposted by Robbie Millen
"Where else will you read that the octogenarian Jean Rhys loved to shop at Miss Selfridge?" I reviewed Margaret Atwood's memoir Book of Lives - her 65th book in 65 years - featuring school bullies, an opera about home economics, and the end of the Second World War ("As I recall, it was drizzling").
Margaret Atwood’s memoir: ‘I cackle as I give the plot a good twist’
In Book of Lives, the Canadian novelist talks about her writing and life, from being a bullied ‘flat-chested weirdo’ to losing her partner of 46 years
www.thetimes.com
November 2, 2025 at 10:55 AM
"Where else will you read that the octogenarian Jean Rhys loved to shop at Miss Selfridge?" I reviewed Margaret Atwood's memoir Book of Lives - her 65th book in 65 years - featuring school bullies, an opera about home economics, and the end of the Second World War ("As I recall, it was drizzling").
Reposted by Robbie Millen
"The best way to read him would be with all your devices on the other side of a locked door."
Me on Nobel literature laureate László Krasznahorkai, a writer who "fits into the Nobel mould so fully that if he didn’t exist, the committee would have had to make him up."
Me on Nobel literature laureate László Krasznahorkai, a writer who "fits into the Nobel mould so fully that if he didn’t exist, the committee would have had to make him up."
Who is Laszlo Krasznahorkai, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature?
Everything you need to know about this year’s winner and his apocalyptically gloomy novels
www.thetimes.com
October 9, 2025 at 4:53 PM
"The best way to read him would be with all your devices on the other side of a locked door."
Me on Nobel literature laureate László Krasznahorkai, a writer who "fits into the Nobel mould so fully that if he didn’t exist, the committee would have had to make him up."
Me on Nobel literature laureate László Krasznahorkai, a writer who "fits into the Nobel mould so fully that if he didn’t exist, the committee would have had to make him up."
Reposted by Robbie Millen
v pleased by v kind review of The Revolutionists (published on Friday) in the Times. esp as by legendary Simon Sebag Montefiore. www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
October 4, 2025 at 8:05 PM
v pleased by v kind review of The Revolutionists (published on Friday) in the Times. esp as by legendary Simon Sebag Montefiore. www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
“Formidable female novelists, ghastly literary men, a faith-shaken poet, eunuchs, pirates, horny wolves, international terrorists…" It's been great fun to judge this prize ... and here are the six finalists ... www.thebailliegiffordprize.co.uk/inside-the-c...
The Prize announces 2025 shortlist
The Baillie Gifford Prize rewards excellence in non-fiction writing, bringing the best in intelligent reflection on the world to new readers.
www.thebailliegiffordprize.co.uk
October 2, 2025 at 8:26 AM
“Formidable female novelists, ghastly literary men, a faith-shaken poet, eunuchs, pirates, horny wolves, international terrorists…" It's been great fun to judge this prize ... and here are the six finalists ... www.thebailliegiffordprize.co.uk/inside-the-c...
Reposted by Robbie Millen
ICYMI: Jason Burke, Helen Garner, Richard Holmes, Justin Marozzi, Adam Weymouth and Frances Wilson have been shortlisted for the Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction 2025 👇 #BookSky
'Eunuchs, pirates, horny wolves, terrorists': Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction 2025 shortlist revealed
ebx.sh
October 2, 2025 at 8:17 AM
ICYMI: Jason Burke, Helen Garner, Richard Holmes, Justin Marozzi, Adam Weymouth and Frances Wilson have been shortlisted for the Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction 2025 👇 #BookSky
Reposted by Robbie Millen
Me on Gore Vidal's centenary👇
'Vidal saw Christopher Isherwood remind a young Jewish film producer that the Nazis persecuted gay people too. “After all, Hitler killed 600,000 homosexuals.” The young man was not impressed. “But Hitler killed six *million* Jews,” he said sternly. “What are you?” Isherwood asked. “In real estate?”'
Gore Vidal at 100 — the master of the waspish put-down
The American novelist and critic was born a century ago this month. John Self celebrates the best of his provocative, witty writing
www.thetimes.com
October 1, 2025 at 12:12 PM
Me on Gore Vidal's centenary👇
Reposted by Robbie Millen
I often write disparagingly about the internet’s slide towards video but YouTube has also educated me in poetry, philosophy music and art
Here is a YouTube education - a list of videos which form a kind of curriculum in the humanities and the sciences
jmarriott.substack.com/p/a-youtube-...
Here is a YouTube education - a list of videos which form a kind of curriculum in the humanities and the sciences
jmarriott.substack.com/p/a-youtube-...
A YouTube Education
In art, science, philosophy, music and more
jmarriott.substack.com
August 15, 2025 at 10:25 AM
I often write disparagingly about the internet’s slide towards video but YouTube has also educated me in poetry, philosophy music and art
Here is a YouTube education - a list of videos which form a kind of curriculum in the humanities and the sciences
jmarriott.substack.com/p/a-youtube-...
Here is a YouTube education - a list of videos which form a kind of curriculum in the humanities and the sciences
jmarriott.substack.com/p/a-youtube-...
Reposted by Robbie Millen
"Barker can turn on a traditional novelist’s skills. But mostly she chooses not to follow the trad path. She would rather be the Picasso of fiction, breaking the rules to see what comes out."
Me on Nicola Barker's energising and exasperating new novel, TonyInterruptor:
Me on Nicola Barker's energising and exasperating new novel, TonyInterruptor:
Viral madness and jazz riffs: a chaotic comedy for our times
Weird vibes, eccentric characters, odd punctuation — it’s all here in Nicola Barker’s energising and exasperating novel, TonyInterruptor
www.thetimes.com
August 16, 2025 at 8:58 AM
"Barker can turn on a traditional novelist’s skills. But mostly she chooses not to follow the trad path. She would rather be the Picasso of fiction, breaking the rules to see what comes out."
Me on Nicola Barker's energising and exasperating new novel, TonyInterruptor:
Me on Nicola Barker's energising and exasperating new novel, TonyInterruptor:
Reposted by Robbie Millen
"He was a logophile, and loved obscure and little-used words, such as logophile."
John Banville on the new biography of William F Buckley, one of the old arch-conservatives who "would have deplored Donald Trump as a vulgar arriviste, but by jingo they would have voted for him."
John Banville on the new biography of William F Buckley, one of the old arch-conservatives who "would have deplored Donald Trump as a vulgar arriviste, but by jingo they would have voted for him."
William F Buckley, gentleman revolutionary and word-drunk dandy
Sam Tanenhaus in his biography, Buckley, chronicles the life of the combative conservative intellectual
www.thetimes.com
August 17, 2025 at 10:01 AM
"He was a logophile, and loved obscure and little-used words, such as logophile."
John Banville on the new biography of William F Buckley, one of the old arch-conservatives who "would have deplored Donald Trump as a vulgar arriviste, but by jingo they would have voted for him."
John Banville on the new biography of William F Buckley, one of the old arch-conservatives who "would have deplored Donald Trump as a vulgar arriviste, but by jingo they would have voted for him."
Reposted by Robbie Millen
My review of Derek Peterson's quirky and intriguing book on Idi Amin's Uganda: www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
Idi Amin — why ‘Big Daddy’ is popular in modern Uganda
Derek R Peterson in his revisionist history argues that the brutal dictator’s regime was built on genuine popular appeal
www.thetimes.com
August 11, 2025 at 2:43 PM
My review of Derek Peterson's quirky and intriguing book on Idi Amin's Uganda: www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
This was fun to do ... the best 25 British/Irish novels of the past 25 years www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
The 25 best novels of the 21st century — from Kazuo Ishiguro to Hilary Mantel
Our literary team pick the top British and Irish fiction of the past 25 years, from Sally Rooney and William Boyd to Zadie Smith and Douglas Stuart
www.thetimes.com
August 10, 2025 at 9:44 AM
This was fun to do ... the best 25 British/Irish novels of the past 25 years www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
Reposted by Robbie Millen
“I was born for something more than mere sanity. I was born for so much joy.”
My review of Jennifer Dawson's 1961 novel The Ha-Ha, reissued by Faber Editions, a story of a woman in and out of a mental institution, whose "emotions surge and plunge, and she’s left hanging on like a sailor in a gale."
My review of Jennifer Dawson's 1961 novel The Ha-Ha, reissued by Faber Editions, a story of a woman in and out of a mental institution, whose "emotions surge and plunge, and she’s left hanging on like a sailor in a gale."
‘I was born for more than mere sanity’: life in a 1950s institution
Jennifer Dawson’s reissued 1961 novel, The Ha-Ha, draws on her own experience — she had a breakdown in her final year at Oxford and spent six months on a psychiatric ward
www.thetimes.com
August 7, 2025 at 10:42 AM
“I was born for something more than mere sanity. I was born for so much joy.”
My review of Jennifer Dawson's 1961 novel The Ha-Ha, reissued by Faber Editions, a story of a woman in and out of a mental institution, whose "emotions surge and plunge, and she’s left hanging on like a sailor in a gale."
My review of Jennifer Dawson's 1961 novel The Ha-Ha, reissued by Faber Editions, a story of a woman in and out of a mental institution, whose "emotions surge and plunge, and she’s left hanging on like a sailor in a gale."
Reposted by Robbie Millen
Ever wondered what the deal is with the InsideSuccess kids outside London stations who tell you they are raising money to stop knife crime? I have. Well @jim.londoncentric.media of London Centric has done the leg work, as ever.
substack.com/inbox/post/1...
substack.com/inbox/post/1...
Why can't anyone stop the fundraisers outside London stations?
Inside Success and WeRBlighty have broken the law with their fundraising activities. So why are they are allowed to continue operating outside the capital's busiest railway stations?
substack.com
August 8, 2025 at 7:54 AM
Ever wondered what the deal is with the InsideSuccess kids outside London stations who tell you they are raising money to stop knife crime? I have. Well @jim.londoncentric.media of London Centric has done the leg work, as ever.
substack.com/inbox/post/1...
substack.com/inbox/post/1...
I reviewed this history of organised crime. Full of fascinating stuff ... and I loved the story about the owner of Porky's, a Miami topless bar, who tried to buy a Russian submarine www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
It’s a gangster’s paradise — how crime organises our world
Mark Galeotti in his excitable history, Homo Criminalis, shows the ways that the underworld shapes society, from Aztec cocoa bean counterfeiting to nefarious dealings on the dark web
www.thetimes.com
August 3, 2025 at 8:44 AM
I reviewed this history of organised crime. Full of fascinating stuff ... and I loved the story about the owner of Porky's, a Miami topless bar, who tried to buy a Russian submarine www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
Reposted by Robbie Millen
Please enjoy this Klimt Eastwood
August 1, 2025 at 8:36 PM
Please enjoy this Klimt Eastwood
On Bullshit came out 20 years ago. Harry Frankfurt was prescient about the post-truth social menace. Our age is so much bullshittier ... www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
We’re living in the age of BS … and it’s only going to get worse
Twenty years ago, the philosopher Harry G Frankfurt’s witty and influential essay, On Bullshit, was first published. Now reissued, it’s timelier than ever
www.thetimes.com
August 2, 2025 at 1:31 PM
On Bullshit came out 20 years ago. Harry Frankfurt was prescient about the post-truth social menace. Our age is so much bullshittier ... www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
Reposted by Robbie Millen
I read a superb new history of Carthage by Eve MacDonald - a finer cicerone than Flaubert - for @thetimes.com. My lead review today:
www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
Don’t believe Roman lies — Carthage was civilised
In Roman propaganda it was a place of debauchery and child sacrifice, but in her new history Eve MacDonald shows that life in the ancient empire was surprisingly sophisticated
www.thetimes.com
August 2, 2025 at 11:53 AM
I read a superb new history of Carthage by Eve MacDonald - a finer cicerone than Flaubert - for @thetimes.com. My lead review today:
www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
Reposted by Robbie Millen
Great to see Ben Markovits longlisted for the Booker Prize for his novel The Rest of Our Lives - a slim study of middle-aged ennui set on the US highway.
Here's my review for @thetimes.com
www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
Here's my review for @thetimes.com
www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
How to deal with a midlife crisis — get in a car and keep driving
The Rest of Our Lives by Ben Markovits is the story of a man who escapes his ‘C-minus marriage’ by taking an impromptu road trip across America
www.thetimes.com
July 29, 2025 at 1:35 PM
Great to see Ben Markovits longlisted for the Booker Prize for his novel The Rest of Our Lives - a slim study of middle-aged ennui set on the US highway.
Here's my review for @thetimes.com
www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
Here's my review for @thetimes.com
www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
Reposted by Robbie Millen
Thirteen novels, eleven publishers, nine nationalities, seven women, six men, five Brits, four books under 200 pages, three Fabers, two debutants ... and one dud.
My rundown of a quietly solid Booker Prize 2025 longlist:
My rundown of a quietly solid Booker Prize 2025 longlist:
Booker prize longlist 2025: our critic’s verdict
A quietly strong list includes novels by Claire Adam, Kiran Desai, Ben Markovits, Andrew Miller and David Szalay
www.thetimes.com
July 29, 2025 at 1:02 PM
Thirteen novels, eleven publishers, nine nationalities, seven women, six men, five Brits, four books under 200 pages, three Fabers, two debutants ... and one dud.
My rundown of a quietly solid Booker Prize 2025 longlist:
My rundown of a quietly solid Booker Prize 2025 longlist:
Reposted by Robbie Millen
Private Eye hits the nail on the head
July 9, 2025 at 7:57 PM
Private Eye hits the nail on the head
Reposted by Robbie Millen
In the wake of Salt-Path-gate, I wrote about some of the juiciest literary frauds, including JT Leroy (whose fright wig made Warhol’s look understated), Eugenio Montale (did Clive James ever recover?), William Boyd, and of course the guv’nor, the constitutionally shameless James Frey:
Salt Path scandal: the juiciest literary scams, from James Frey to JT LeRoy
As accusations around Raynor Winn’s bestseller come to light, our critic rounds up the greatest scams, hoaxes and frauds in publishing history
www.thetimes.com
July 7, 2025 at 5:25 PM
In the wake of Salt-Path-gate, I wrote about some of the juiciest literary frauds, including JT Leroy (whose fright wig made Warhol’s look understated), Eugenio Montale (did Clive James ever recover?), William Boyd, and of course the guv’nor, the constitutionally shameless James Frey:
Reposted by Robbie Millen
An honour for me to write about the wonderful novel, Under The Volcano: www.thetimes.com/culture/book... (Kudos to the subs too - "heroic, fervid and funny" is a fine summary.)
Beer, whisky, mescal — this is the great novel of alcoholic self-destruction
It took ten despairing years for Malcolm Lowry to get Under the Volcano published. But this tale of a British diplomat’s drunken progress in Mexico is heroic, fervid and funny
www.thetimes.com
July 3, 2025 at 8:52 AM
An honour for me to write about the wonderful novel, Under The Volcano: www.thetimes.com/culture/book... (Kudos to the subs too - "heroic, fervid and funny" is a fine summary.)
Reposted by Robbie Millen
A big, bustling novel about love, friendship, money, ambition and the 21st century, packed with humour and intelligent observations … I finished it tear-stained' @thetimes.com
Read the full review of #DraytonandMackenzie by Alexander Starritt 🌊 shorturl.at/KAmZT
Read the full review of #DraytonandMackenzie by Alexander Starritt 🌊 shorturl.at/KAmZT
This punchy satire is Dickens meets The Big Short
Drayton and Mackenzie, Alexander Starritt’s new novel, takes on the world of Oxbridge, McKinsey and tech bros with brio
shorturl.at
June 19, 2025 at 7:59 AM
A big, bustling novel about love, friendship, money, ambition and the 21st century, packed with humour and intelligent observations … I finished it tear-stained' @thetimes.com
Read the full review of #DraytonandMackenzie by Alexander Starritt 🌊 shorturl.at/KAmZT
Read the full review of #DraytonandMackenzie by Alexander Starritt 🌊 shorturl.at/KAmZT