Portraits

portraits

Bohumil Hrabal — king of palaverers

The Czech writer, whose lively and rambunctious fiction sees his characters veer between lunacy and frivolity; pleasure and pain, lived a complex life, laying bare his own sufferin..

Malcolm Forbes March 10, 2022

portraits

Yosano Akiko — a great of modern Japanese poetry

While Yosano Akiko’s life was full of contradictions, the quality and passion of her poetry remained a constant throughout.

Christopher Harding February 21, 2022

portraits

Elizabeth Thompson — military artist whose star rose and fell with the British Empire

The British painter was the only female artist to achieve fame for her realistic depictions of battle scenes. But as Victorian romanticism for the British Empire faded so did her r..

Jan Marsh February 7, 2022

portraits

Rosaleen Norton — joyful contrarian and occultist turned pioneer for free speech

The ‘Witch of Kings Cross’ Rosaleen Norton’s provocative art and unconventional life brought her notoriety in mid-twentieth century Australian society, but paved the way for a rich..

Christiana Spens January 21, 2022

portraits

Chiang Ching-kuo — dictator or democrat?

To Chiang’s backers, he was a well-intentioned autocrat who put in place the foundations for Taiwan’s democratic transition; to his critics he was a sometimes brutal dictator who a..

Michael Reilly January 12, 2022

portraits

Lucrezia Orsina Vizzana — singular and strikingly modern composer

Born in the late sixteenth-century and cloistered from earliest childhood, Lucrezia Orsina Vizzana became Bologna’s only nun to publish her music, despite unrelenting clerical oppo..

Craig A. Monson December 14, 2021

portraits

Gustav Stresemann — The man who almost saved the world

Stresemann guided the Weimar Republic through its post-war crisis with agility and tenacity. The question of whether he might have been able to do the same following the Wall Stree..

Katja Hoyer December 3, 2021

portraits

General James Oglethorpe — a man of uncommon vivacity

He founded the city of Savannah and the state of Georgia, but this was just a short interlude in a life of conviction and adventure; shame and redemption.

Suzanne Raine November 23, 2021

portraits

Valeriy Lobanovskyi: The greatest football coach you’ve never heard of

A mathematician, a footballer, and very nearly a plumber, Valeriy Lobanovskyi was a leading light of the Soviet era and combined his intellectual interests with the love of the gam..

Josh Mcloughlin November 9, 2021