MATTHEW HAWKINS applauds a psychotherapist’s disection of William Blake
‘I believe in the fantastic as a crucial part of literature’
Novelist CHRISTOPHER PRIEST talks to Andy Hedgecock about his latest novel, set in an otherworldly archipelago where thousands of islands offer endless climactic, cultural and political possibilities
[Eric Messel/Creative Commons] 
New releases from Christina Alden and Alex Patterson, Odette Michell, Clementine Lovell
JOHN GREEN is fascinated by a very readable account of Britain’s involvement in South America
Strip cartoons used to be the bread and butter of newspapers and they have been around for centuries. MICHAL BONCZA asks our own Paul Tanner about which bees are in his bonnet
GORDON PARSONS acknowledges the authority with which Sarah Kane’s theatrical justification for suicide has resonance today
RON JACOBS welcomes a timely homage to one of the IWW and CPUSA’s most effective orators
“I WRITE instinctively, responding to impulses,” says Christopher Priest. “Most of my books since The Affirmation have a double quality — on one level, the main one, they are stories to be told, intended to be enjoyed, and which will probably contain some ideas that intrigue the reader.
“The second level is a sort of invitation to the reader to join in the process, to see and understand the book from another viewpoint, to accept that it is fiction.”
Written in 1981, The Affirmation is set in a region of wonders called the Dream Archipelago. It was my portal into Priest’s witty and philosophical science fiction, which tackles deception, the plasticity of reality and the malleable nature of memory and perception. Subverting genre conventions, it explores the nature of storytelling.
More from this author
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ANDREW HEDGECOCK relishes visual storytelling with no respect for genres, movements or styles
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