On Food, Sex And God

Food, sex and God’ is what Michèle Roberts answers when strangers ask what she writes about, and indeed, she has made these subjects her own in her fiction and her poetry. Now we see that extended to non-fiction in this collection of essays, reviews and articles. Ranging over people and places, writing and imagination, books, spirituality, art and food, Roberts shows herself to be a perceptive and provocative commentator on contemporary life. From a funny monologue on would-be writers who prefer last year’s creative writing teacher (male); to musings on a writer’s life and work; to reviews of Marina Warner and Jeanette Winterson; to a magnificent piece on autobiographical writing and the imagination, this collection adds to our understanding of her as writer. Her keen sense of the outrageous, her striving for intellectual honesty and her ability to find the sensual in the everyday, leave one in no doubt about a talent that is as original and generous in non-fiction as in her celebrated novels.