I found this a surprising and welcome book. At first consideration, a book that simply compiles an author’s accumulated book reviews might be expected to be a pot-boiling record of the essays he has been commissioned to write, however venerable the author might be. I suppose that if there is an exception that renders such expectations erroneous it would have to be by Burgess. Anthony Burgess was one of Britain's most erudite authors, with a string of vital novels to his name, even discounting the most misunderstood of these, 'A Clockwork Orange'. Every word of his literary output sings with meaning and power, and his output could be considered an education in the English language, encouraging the autodidact and nurturing the pedant. I found myself mentally querying particular words and thinking about them and their context, invariably being stimulated by my conclusions. The reviews seem to date from the early 1980s – the book is admittedly remiss in not providing a bibliography for the pieces, which number around 200 in the almost 600 pages of the collection – and they provide a detailed survey of living and recent writers of mostly English works. Burgess' passions, such as James Joyce, emerge strongly in what is presumably a highly personal choice. The collection also covers dictionaries and other non-fictional books, and as befits a man who had leanings towards musical composition, music, composers and musicians are well represented. The book takes its title from one of the earlier pieces, but is largely irrelevant. A gem of a book, complementary for any of Burgess' admirers. ( )

Quite a mixed bag. The anti-feminism is a bit boring. But some of the items (most are reprints of book reviews) on the English language are well worth paying attention to. ( )