I hesitate to criticise the device, because it has too many converts for that to be a winning game – already, critics of my acquaintance have countered that you can mark your favourite quotes easily, and that you can search for occurrences of words or ph

Latest of the Vimes sub-series of Discworld novels by Terry Pratchett; once again, as in Thud, he takes Vimes out of Ankh-Morpork and the story is the better for it. I really enjoyed the combination of toilet humour (because poo is always funny) with col

Sophie Kinsella makes no apologies for writing about women's silliness, DECCA AITKENHEAD writesqc What do we think about chick lit? It's a question that has been on a sort of literary loop for about 15 years. Harmless escapism? Cynical commercialism? Pos

TORONTO - The time-space wormhole opens, and out steps Whit Stillman. The filmmaker has changed alarmingly little since his last film, 1998’s “The Last Days of Disco.’’ The hair is a donnish gray now, but it still flops across his brow with preppie ease.

The Irish writer Colm Tóibín is best known for his powerful, contemplative fiction, but has also long been respected as a journalist, literary critic and essayist. The latter writing skills are to the fore in this insightful and compassionate collection

Men throughout time have searched for their mate. It is the guiding force of the male to continue on their genetic line. What of love? Is love the guiding force now for men, are men more romantic than they were or have women through romantic books, sonne

Is it time for us to move away from Jane Austen and start rewriting Charlotte Brontë? If so, Margot Livesey has put her hat in the ring. "The Flight of Gemma Hardy" is not subtle about its provenance. Livesey prefaces her book with a "Dear Reader" letter

Cincinnati Shakespeares current stage adaptation of Jane Austens Sense and Sensibility is, as they said back in Regency days, Everything that is charming. The box office is bustling on this show, so book now. I am going to suggest that you read or re-re

Reading a Jane Austen novel, our first observation is often how precise and measured the language is, even when characters seemingly lose all patience with themselves and the world. Everyone is “exceedingly sorry” about matters expressed as “arrant nonse

The word "pride" brings to mind packs of lions, school spirit and LGBT celebrations. But put it next to the word "prejudice," and even if you're not a classic literature fan, you'll probably be thinking about Jane Austen's iconic 19th-century novel. Or a

New Rising Media chat to the team behind dark mystery-thriller 'Yesterday', developer of the million-selling Runaway series and The Next BIG Thing: Pendulo Studios. NRM writes "We make the kind of games that we’d love to play. They are small games, but c

‘She has poured forth her tender tale of love in vain and exposed herself forever to the contempt of the whole world’ These three short works show Jane Austen experimenting with a variety of different literary styles, from melodrama to satire, and explor

EVERYTHING IN New Ways to Kill Your Mother had a previous outing, the majority as reviews. Thanks to ingenious sequencing and immaculate prose, however, it reads like something entirely newly minted. It opens with a chapter on mothers in Jane Austen and

Dancing faces you towards Heaven, whichever direction you turn.

Photo by Scot Allyn. Joan Fox has retired from her post as director of Granby Public Library. GRANBY — Joan Fox, Granby’s longtime public library director, has retired. “Being able, through the years, to provide new services needed by the community has b

For the ordinary person, life didn’t change a jot from pre-history to around 1800. It didn’t matter whether you were born in bucolic 17th century England or a Stone Age cave. Your lot in life would be hardscrabble toil, a cramped dirt-floor home and a sw

I grew up watching Masterpiece Theater (and once impersonated Alistair Cooke for a multi-media presentation by my mother), so the current popularity of Downton Abbey, which concludes its second season on Sunday, Feb. 19 in the United States, comes as lit

Lone Madrone, the Slaves — Americana and alternative country, 8:30 p.m. , Axe and Fiddle, 657 E. Main St. , Cottage Grove. $5. (541-942-5942) “Northanger Abbey” — The Roving Park Players present a new adaptation of Jane Austen’s work, 7 p.m. , Good...

Matchmaking, love, deceit, humor — Pioneer Theatre Company has it all with the opening of Jane Austen’s “Emma,” adapted by Jon Jory, a theatrical director, playwright and New York Theatre Hall of Fame inductee. The story tells the tale of headstrong Emma