Three months of the year gone already. What have I been reading?

The non-fiction I have most enjoyed (and learnt the most from) is Stephen Greenblatt’s immensely readable *The Swerve* about the rediscovery of Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura. I had been meaning to read the book for a while, so thanks to James Marriott’s always-interesting Substack Cultural Capital for providing the final prompt to get a copy. The book has its critics, but I found it gripping and hugely enlightening.

And new fiction? I much enjoyed Ali Smith’s *Glyph* — and that prompted me to reread, with great pleasure, what I still think is her best book, *How to be Both*. Evidently, though, Ali Smith divides her readers — she is one of the few authors that Mrs Logic Matters and I just don’t at all see eye to eye on.

I also raced through Julian Barnes’ latest book *Departure(s)* — I have long been a great fan of Barnes’ writing, fiction and non-fiction alike. And reading this — his last book (or so he announces) — I realised that we had never got a copy of Barnes’ first book, *Metroland*. The omission has been rectified. And period piece though it is, we both very much enjoyed it.

But the stand-out book for me in the last months of winter was this year’s Dickens, *Great Expectations*. There just are so many wonderful set pieces, episodes that really demand to be declaimed and read out loud round a fire … I resisted, while hugely admiring. The very ending, however? Dickens’ first thoughts were surely the truer.