"It’s one of the great documents of the wilder shores of the Jewish mind, but this is great writing for everyone"

It doesn’t shy away from forging connections between philosophy and ordinary life. Which is the essence of stand-up comedy

The first gay rights manifesto in English

This novel is alchemised into true art by a poet’s vision that left me with questions I was compelled to ask again, and again

As a young, angry black man in the 1980s, it was a revelation to find a dead white poet that made sense to me

Reading about ancient Chinese poetry led me into a way of seeing things that I hadn't been aware of before

"I keep this book in the smallest room, a place of solitude where contemplation of one’s own mortality is wont to arise"

"It was like a rite of passage—one that got me thinking about relationships between languages, about how they evolve, change and borrow from each other"

Whoever slipped the copy of that book to me at Nelson Thomlinson Grammar School that summer set me on a path

Finding the book again reminded me of the sheer joy of curiosity, adventure and discovery