Review by Kevan Manwaring of "The University of Bliss" by Julian Stannard

Julian Stannard’s slim novel (novella, really) is an excoriating satire of Higher Education. It is also a near-future dystopia, but one told with jaunty gallows humour – try to imagine George Orwell meets PG Wodehouse, if you can, and you’ll be near the mark. Set in an overly-surveilled, debilitatingly techno-demented semi-police state of 2035 (which feels not a stone’s throw from the present day) in the south of England, the titular University of Bliss is a venerable Arts-based HE institution with an ecclesiastical heritage. It charts the ridiculous (mostly) benign dictatorship of the vacuous VC and toadyish Senior Leadership Team: the anodyne initiatives and vacuous doublespeak, dumbing down and bending over for the sacred cow of the "student experience," and endless impositions upon the already overstretched academic staff, who seem to be least vital part of this extractivist factory-farm-food-chain.

It is good to see a book written with rage.

This is a venting of a spleen that many in academe could relate to: a rage against the iniquities of the broken HE sector, and the general inanity of modern life (emails are called "doomails," and the World Wide Web the "Wob"). It made me laugh out loud at times, and there were many great lines that deserved writing down (e.g. "Anodyne is the New Paradigm"; "Simple slogans illuminated the university: Be Good Enough, Reach for the Possible, Read Only When You Feel the Urge, The University Is All About You"; "Freedom of Speech is OK But Watch What You Say!").  

Perhaps this is indicative of Stannard as an accomplished poet – who seems better at turning a good phrase, than writing plot. The comedy here is the driving force, perhaps relentlessly so. There is a strafing of intertextuality and literary in-jokes. It is also very scatological, with a lot of defecating, masturbating, and sweaty saucy seaside-postcard-type shenanigans—a kind of Carry On Academia, mixed with the rough-and-ready humour of the Commedia dell Arte and Punch and Judy. Writing a satire is like making a balloon puppet with spiky gloves – the intention is hard-edged, but the result is often insubstantial. One can imagine this amusing the converted, but never striking the actual targets. It will most likely fall under their radar—a schoolboyish (if erudite and accomplished) in-joke, passed beneath the desk to fellow sufferers.  

The whole religious subplot about the Blessed Aubergine felt irrelevant. Religion is a rather broad target to hit, whereas the ridiculousness, shallowness, and hypocrisy of the HE sector in its current state feels like a more focused, and original target. The characters are lightly-sketched, larger-than-life cyphers for the "types" found in academe, from the cleaner to the Vice Chancellor. We focus most of all on poet and lecturer, Dr Harry Blink, although it seems clear we are not really meant to emotionally invest in any of the characters. There is a climax, when the absurdity reaches its zenith, which could be seen as cathartic, but it is better to just enjoy the one-liners rather than worry too much about "set up and pay off" and other contrivances of fiction.

Overall, it feels like a timely updating of the campus novel, and one that deserves to be read widely in academe – as a "deprogramming" from the modern hallucination that it is under, where it seems teaching is the last thing that "happens" and actual endeavour of education the least valued amid the miasma of bureaucracy and insultingly reductive initiatives focused on cash cow demographics, curricula driven by finance and marketing, "optics," "staff wellbeing," survey results and league tables. The University of Bliss feels like a much-needed enema to all of that.

About the reviewer
Dr Kevan Manwaring is the MA Creative Writing programme leader at Arts University Bournemouth. He is the author of Writing Ecofiction (Palgrave Macmillan), The Ecological Imaginary in Literature and Other Media (Routledge), Heavy Weather (The British Library), and others. His latest novel is Thunder Road. 

You can read more about The University of Bliss by Julian Stannard on Creative Writing at Leicester here. 

Review by Kevan Manwaring of "Out of Sheer Rage" by Geoff Dyer

An attempt to review a book is to put into words what one thinks about it. One perhaps starts off by not having a firm opinion but by the end of the review, if all goes well, one has been formulated. This does not really change the nature of the book, but it may change the person writing the review, or possibly the person reading it. It may persuade or dissuade this hypothetical reader to buy the book, or it may affirm or conflict with their existing opinion about it, if they’ve already read it – or simply read lots of reviews. It is a chain of ghosts, drawing us further and further away from the book itself, itself an articulation of an experience (either direct, vicariously, or imagined), encoded into black marks, which we translate in our minds into thoughts, feelings, images, and sounds. A homeopathic dilution of real life – that could be a working definition of fiction, creative non-fiction and especially literary criticism. Dyer’s book is, in some senses, a critique and deconstruction of this hall of mirrors. It is an anti-biography, an apparently ‘failed’ attempt at a ‘book about DH Lawrence’ (that we all end up writing, sooner or later, in the Dyerverse of ever decreasing circles – the singularity of futility which is his MO), which, in its gonzo approach of endless digression, indulgences, annoyances, paranoia, and transgressions, actually ‘succeeds’ in channelling something Lawrentian. Dyer makes endless comic capital at of the vainglorious absurdity of ‘experiential research’, while actually undertaking it – globetrotting in pursuit of Lawrence in a form of protracted displacement activity, an endless deferment of gratification – by gratifying every deferment. By the pathological deconstruction of such an approach Dyer actually reifies it, as he finally admits: ‘Had we not seen and done all these things we would not be the people we are’ (p231).  Dyer’s antics is a form of invocation – though he protest too much (ad nauseam) his aches, pains, mishaps, moments of weaknesses, fury, frustration and many failings, all help to conjure Lawrence, to embody Lawrence, to live Lawrence: ‘hoping by this Lawrentian touch to persuade my audience of the all-consuming bond between the subject and the speaker of the talk’ as he quips about a botched talk on Lawrence he gives (p206). He argues forcibly against the aridity of dusty academic studies, far removed from Lorenzo’s full-blooded approach to life – mocking the ivory towers even as he moves to ‘Dullford’ as he calls Oxford, his very own alma mater. His restlessness and neurosis are very much first world problems from the perspective of male, white privilege, at that (the modest lower middle class roots long since abandoned), and as such, his self-ironic posturing would be facile if it wasn’t so frequently funny. And despite his disingenuity – Dyer wears his erudition very lightly – this is only a performance of philistinism within the context of … a book about DH Lawrence. Yet there is method to Dyer’s madness and there are moments of genius, or at least, great wit: ‘Spare me the drudgery of systematic examinations and give me the lightning flashes of those wild books in which there is no attempt to cover the ground thoroughly or reasonably’ (p105). And yes, Out of Sheer Rage is full of mini-lightning flashes as we observe the synaptic pyrotechnics of Dyer’s overheated brain. It is amusing, almost transgressive, like listening in to the ‘mad’ person at the party who says all the things everyone is thinking. This is writing as Tourette’s Syndrome. Dyer plays the court jester with gusto and perhaps makes some valid points amid his buffoonery. He is entertaining, but exasperating. To spend too long in his company would be grating, but for a while his Lawrentian ‘playback theatre’ is a gloriously irreverent read. And as an approach to ‘life-writing’ it has some originality and literary merit: it has a pulse. But that is perhaps only a reviewer seeking an ending to his review and wanting something positive to end on.


About the reviewer
Kevan Manwaring is a Creative Writing PhD candidate at the University of Leicester, currently working on a novel dramatizing the folk traditions of the Scottish Lowlands and Southern Appalachians. He blogs and tweets as the Bardic Academic.

Favourite Reads of 2017

At the end of 2017, we asked readers to nominate a favourite read of the year, and write a one-sentence review of their chosen book. The book could be from any time or genre - the only qualification was that it had to be a book the reader found particularly memorable, striking or enjoyable during the last twelve months. Here are the responses we received. Wishing everyone a happy new year of reading and books!


Barbara Cooke 

The Bees by Laline Paull: "1984 in a hive, with more eco-criticism, and a happier ending."

Laurie Cusack

Solar Bones by Mike McCormack: "It made me shiver with joy; should’ve won the Booker by a country mile!"

Sharon Eckman

The Book of Dust: La Belle Sauvage by Philip Pullman: "long-awaited, every bit as wonderful as hoped for ... Glorious."

Peter Flack 

This Must Be the Place by Maggie O'Farrell: "Life and love on a one track train line that eventually passes everywhere."

Simon King

The Little Demon by Fyodor Sologub: "Early twentieth-century Russian writing of the cruel and satirical kind, this tale of a sadistic and insecure provincial schoolmaster is as black as a diseased lung."

Kevan Manwaring 

The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead: "Boldly genre-bending, defiantly imaginative, and beautifully-crafted, it seems eerily resonant - a novel about an alternative past that is really about now." 

Alexandros Plasatis

The Complete Short Stories by James Purdy: "A sensitive observer, his prose is gentle and, when needed, fierce."

Robert Richardson

The Road by Cormac McCarthy: "The magnificent 2007 Pulitzer Prize winner has a setting of the terrifying aftermath of environmental disaster while still affirming humanity."

Jonathan Taylor

The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway: "a masterpiece of storytelling. You feel like you're there, on the boat, with the old man."

Maria Taylor 

Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy: "I have nothing more to say than I loved reading this book." 

Miranda Taylor (aged 9)

Toto the Ninja Cat by Dermot O'Leary: "because it's fun and silly. It was fun to read and it took me only two days."

Rosalind Taylor (aged 9)

Rabbityness by Jo Empson "because it's my favourite book of all time."

Paul Taylor-McCartney 

Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders: "A heart-rending and life-affirming journey into that purgatorial space between knowable historical fact and extreme creative invention."  

Harry Whitehead

Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari: "for making me see that industrial farming is the 'greatest crime in history' - now what the hell am I to do?"

Review by Kevan Manwaring of "The Loney" by Andrew Michael Hurley

This impressive debut novel, previously published by Tartarus Press, has sucked in accolades like quicksand – which would normally be enough to put me off reading it, being the contrarian that I am, but in this case I decided to give it a punt (thanks to my local library – use ‘em or lose ‘em). For once the praise seems justified. The Loney is an atmospheric study in faith, truth and the uncanny. It focuses on two brothers – one an elective mute – growing up in a Catholic corner of 1970s London. The universe of the novel is limited to their immediate family – the overbearing ‘Mummer’ and forebearing ‘Farther’ – and faith community, the claustrophobic, competitive parish riddled with sins, small and large. When their much-loved priest dies, a new Father tries his best to shepherd this unruly, opinionated flock. The annual pilgrimage to a shrine on the Lancashire coast, to the lonely stretch of the title, vividly evoked by Hurley, is hoped to cure all ills – especially the mutism of ‘Hanny’, the narrator’s brother. Instead, the trip opens up a whole can of worms. I must admit that I found the relentless pettiness and neurotic Catholic minutiae less engaging than the Loney itself – which is the real ‘star’ of this narrative. The author succeeds in creating a tangible sense of place, one that epitomizes the ‘English eerie’ as discussed by Robert Macfarlane and others. The Loney has a brooding sense of malevolence, as though the bleak section of coastline was the antagonist itself. Something chthonic and unwelcoming lingers there. The remoteness and neglect provides a zone of projection for the inchoate fears of urbanites (something that has been happening in English Literature since Beowulf). Whether the drear flatlands of the Fens, the grim North Country of the Gawain poet, or the blasted heath of Shakespeare, Britain’s few wildernesses offer a dark playground for imagined terrors. There are shades of The Wicker Man here – the spectre of dodgy pagan rituals awaiting the unwary who stumble upon them (the pilgrims might as well have ‘sacrifice’ pinned on their backs), although the ‘terror’ scale here is less Hammer, and more Hill. Hurley’s aesthetic reminded me of many of Susan Hill’s settings – lonely stretches of coastline, causewayed islets, chancy footing and vindictive tides. Madness always in the wings, or in the annexe. The Loney’s ‘heart of darkness’, Coldbarrow, could be in Hill’s real estate portfolio. One could imagine The Woman in Black’s sister living there. The stifling religiosity, small-mindedness and demonization of difference also reminded me of Jeanette Winterson’s Oranges are Not the Only Fruit. And I found shades of Graham Joyce also – although his prose has more warmth and humour to it – and a broader church than depicted here. The Loney is simply modern Gothic. Hurley has done nothing new under the sun here, but as a debut it is supremely confident, polished and promising. His prose is unshowy, no-nonsense, and easy-to-read, but there are poetic flourishes – distinctive dialect, arresting analogies, striking imagery – which make it punch above its weight at times. The ending is open and unsettling. Hurley resists exegesis and closure. What we are to make of the strange events is left to us to gnaw over in the middle of the night, while the existential wind of nameless terrors howls outside. Take it on holiday with you to an isolated cottage and scare the bejeezus out of yourself.


About the reviewer
Kevan Manwaring is currently undertaking a Creative Writing PhD at the University of Leicester (in the form of a novel). He is an Eccles Centre Postgraduate Fellow in North American Studies at the British Library, and teaches creative writing for the Open University. One day he hopes to have a proper job. Blog: https://thebardicacademic.wordpress.com/

Review by Kevan Manwaring of “TransAtlantic” by Colum McCann

This impressive multi-linear novel weaves together apparently disparate lives from both sides of the Atlantic: early aviation pioneers, Alcock and Brown (the first to cross the Atlantic by powered flight); Abolitionist campaigner and former slave, Frederick Douglass; Senator George Mitchell, brokering peace at Stormount in the late 90s; Newfoundland journalist, Emily Ehrlich, and her ancestors and descendants.

Each narrative thread is exquisitely rendered in convincing detail, the result of painstaking research (courtesy of the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation). Each paradigm presented is so dramatically different (on the surface) that the project could echo David Mitchell’s Cloud Atlas approach. However, the critical difference is: a consistency of style and tone. McCann isn’t playing genre-games, but seems more interested in how ostensibly diverse lives intersect – the echoes and resonances rippling throughout history, back-and-forth across three thousand miles and more. The novel isn’t trying to be flashy, but quietly builds up its complexity through an accretion of narrative detail. The framing narrative (hinted at in the fragmentary prologue) – a tumbledown house by a lough in the north of Ireland – doesn’t gain significance until a lot later, when we realise what lives have passed through it. The staccato sound of the gulls dropping shells upon the roof – to crack them open – seems to trigger the memories. The past is cracked open, one shell at a time. Although some remain unbroken, and “lay there like a thing unexploded.” This threat of narrative ordnance lingers over the novel, hides in every chapter, a gunman in the hedgerow, the bomb in the flowerbed – the violent parenthesis to peace. The end to slavery, the end to the Troubles – these are achievements of human endeavour fought for by brave men and women, and never to be taken for granted.

This novel honours the shoulders we stand upon without being bombastic or overly-aware of its own importance. It builds up the profundity in quiet ways, in the rendering of character and place. McCann is a master of the terse sentence, the elided phrase. His syntax is knapped down to its essence, and he builds his prose like a drystone-wall builder, slotting his hard, flinty material into place with a clink. And in a similar way, his plot falls into place – block by block – until it presents an impressive bridge across an ocean. An ambitious, humane novel of haunting beauty.

About the reviewer
Kevan Manwaring is currently undertaking a Creative Writing PhD at the University of Leicester (in the form of a novel). He is an Eccles Centre Postgraduate Fellow in North American Studies at the British Library, and teaches creative writing for the Open University. One day he hopes to have a proper job. Blog: https://thebardicacademic.wordpress.com/