Falsehoods and filth

Gerri Kimber Katherine Mansfield A hidden life 304pp. Reaktion. £20. Whenever a new biography of a well-known literary figure is published, the reader always hopes that the author may have included so

Gerald Howard’s The Insider is a crowded but colourful portrait of Malcolm Cowley, poet, editor and chronicler of the so-called Lost Generation – those American exemplars of literary modernism who, li

George Moore Confessions of a Young Man Edited by Matthew Creasy 272pp. Modern Humanities Research Association. Paperback, £18.99. Virginia Woolf judged that the Irish novelist George Moore (1852–1933

A biography is a daunting task for any writer. How can you summarise a life? Can you realistically cover all of the source material? If the subject is well known, there are probably rival biographies.

So Vincent van Gogh wrote to his brother Theo in October 1876, charting the latest instalment of the Holbein cult. He was renting a room in Isleworth, west London, still hoping for a religious career

Lola Young Eight Weeks Looking back, moving forwards, defying the odds 336pp. Penguin. Paperback, £10.99. Lola Young has been a crossbench member of the House of Lords since 2004. She is also an emeri