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Joe @lifeisnotanovel.bsky.social · 19h

Here’s my short critique for of the speech columnist/thinker/Olympian Matthew Syed gave at the Conservative Party Conference earlier this week. My thanks to George Monaghan for commissioning the piece and choosing the pensive cover image.

The New Statesman @handle.invalid · 1d

The folly of Matthew Syed, by Joseph Williams

The Conservatives’ favourite public intellectual has nothing new to say

The folly of Matthew Syed

The Conservatives’ favourite public intellectual has nothing new to say

www.newstatesman.com

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Reposted by Joe

Joe @lifeisnotanovel.bsky.social · May 28

My @unherd.com piece looking back at The History Man half a century on is published today, with reference to Lorna Sage, David Lodge, Ian Watt’s pet boa constrictor, Kingers and Conkers, Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft, the Black Papers on education, & more unherd.com/2025/05/less...

Lessons from The History Man

unherd.com

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Joe @lifeisnotanovel.bsky.social · Jun 12

Thanks mate! Appreciate it

Reposted by Joe

UnHerd @unherd.com · May 28

‘Half a century on, Howard Kirk still has plenty to teach us about class, intellectuals, and the real importance of a university education’ | Joe Williams

Lessons from The History Man

Michael Hordern and Anthony Sher in the TV adaptation of Malcom Bradbury's 1975 novel. (Credit: BBC)

unherd.com

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Joe @lifeisnotanovel.bsky.social · May 28

My @unherd.com piece looking back at The History Man half a century on is published today, with reference to Lorna Sage, David Lodge, Ian Watt’s pet boa constrictor, Kingers and Conkers, Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft, the Black Papers on education, & more unherd.com/2025/05/less...

Lessons from The History Man

unherd.com

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Joe @lifeisnotanovel.bsky.social · May 27

Thanks Michael! I look forward to reading this

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Joe @lifeisnotanovel.bsky.social · Apr 9

My short review of ‘The Reapers’, Ivan Morison’s imposing yet wacky set of four-metre-high piles of ‘agricultural material’, is now on my substack: lifeisnotanovel.substack.com/p/big-farmer-the-reapers-by-ivan-morison

Big Farmer: The Reapers by Ivan Morison

I tend not to make a habit of standing in a field in the rain. Most days I’d rather do anything else, like wait for a bus or lick a thousand postage stamps.

lifeisnotanovel.substack.com

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Reposted by Joe

Glen O'Hara @gsoh31.bsky.social · Feb 13

One underreported facet of the Great University Crisis is the contribution of a small number of consultancy firms who recommend:
*Centralise functions
*Cut small courses
*Reduce student options
*Abolish loads of joint awards
*Chop staff headcount
This is *exactly* what you must not do. (1/3)

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Joe @lifeisnotanovel.bsky.social · Mar 27

Characteristically witty yet perceptive letter from your humble servant in this week’s TLS

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Joe @lifeisnotanovel.bsky.social · Mar 21

My piece for @boundlessmagazine.bsky.social on Malcolm Bradbury and the real idea behind the UK's first MA in Creative Writing, with reference to Ian McEwan, Doris Lessing, Anthony Burgess, Salman Rushdie, the Goldsmiths Prize etc www.boundlessmagazine.com/p/when-mcewa...

When McEwan met Bradbury

Joseph Williams on the birth of the creative writing course

www.boundlessmagazine.com

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Joe @lifeisnotanovel.bsky.social · Mar 19

A pleasure to join Jesus and Robert Lucas Scott for the launch of his world-historical monograph Reading Hegel with its bombastic green livery

Joe @lifeisnotanovel.bsky.social · Mar 9

Yes please do! I’d be very interested to read it

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Joe @lifeisnotanovel.bsky.social · Mar 6

Long one from me in this week’s @thetls.bsky.social letters, about the fact that Malcolm Bradbury’s The History Man was never really about sociology

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Joe @lifeisnotanovel.bsky.social · Mar 5

I’ve got an idea for an article on the gothic, epistolary fiction, provenance, affect and immediacy… with reference to the obvious combo of Frankenstein, Dracula, M. R. James and (of course) the Castle of Otranto… but no idea where to place it once written. Any recommendations?

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Joe @lifeisnotanovel.bsky.social · Mar 3

Reading Wilfred Owen’s ‘Dulce Et Decorum Est’ I’m struck by the faint sequence of ‘fire or lime’ then ‘thick green light’ then ‘such high zest’. Is this a deliberate citral pun?

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Joe @lifeisnotanovel.bsky.social · Feb 21

Thanks Gabriel!

Joe @lifeisnotanovel.bsky.social · Feb 21

This year I’ll be writing the ‘Fiction 1945-2000’ section for the 2024 edition of The Year’s Work in English Studies. If you published a monograph / chapter / article on (or mostly on) British fiction from 1945 to 2000 between 1st January and 31st December 2024, please let me know! Thanks

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Joe @lifeisnotanovel.bsky.social · Feb 9

Thanks Becky!

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Joe @lifeisnotanovel.bsky.social · Feb 7

Thanks Dominic!

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Joe @lifeisnotanovel.bsky.social · Feb 7

Thanks mate!

Joe @lifeisnotanovel.bsky.social · Feb 7

I’ve just been made aware that if you are just one month late paying a tuition fee payment, @uniofeastanglia.bsky.social will slap on a £50 ‘late fee’ before emailing or ringing to check on you (and your ‘welfare’) and ask why you aren’t able to pay the fee. Even HMRC offer payment plans! Outrageous

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