Michael Symmons Roberts’s fourth book of poetry, Corpus, was the winner of the 2004 Whitbread Poetry Award, and was shortlisted for the T. S. Eliot Prize, the Forward Prize, and the Griffin International Prize. His sixth collection, Drysalter, was the winner of both the Forward Prize and the Costa Poetry Prize in 2013. He collaborated with Paul Farley on Edgelands (Cape/Vintage) and will do so again in The Deaths of the Poets (Cape, 2017). He has also worked many times with the composer James MacMillan. He has published two novels, and is Professor of Poetry at Manchester Metropolitan University.

Michael Symmons Roberts

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Joseph Heller

Bob Slocum is anxious, bored and fearful of his job. So why is it he wants nothing more than the chance to speak at the next company convention? In this darkly satirical book, Joseph Heller takes us for a turn on the maddening hamster wheel of work. Heller’s workplace is a cradle of paranoia, bravado and nauseating banter, forever shadowed by that perennial question, who’s really running the show here? In Heller’s hands, our daily grind has never seemed so absurd. 
 
Selected from the book Something Happened by Joseph Heller 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
Drinking by John Cheever 
Swimming by Roger Deakin 
Liberty by Virginia Woolf 
Death by Julian Barnes

Work

Vintage Minis

Mark Haddon

‘Family, that slippery word, a star to every wandering bark and everyone sailing under a different sky’ 
 
Where do you go if you can’t feel at home in your own family? When the people who made you can’t fathom who you become? In these three tales of quarrelling clans and fraught reunions, Mark Haddon shows family in its frank, unsparing yet frequently absurd light, and, in doing so charts a stormy course into the crucible of the self. 
 
Selected from The Pier Falls, The Red House and A Spot of Bother. 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
Discover the in the Vintage Minis ‘Head Space’ series: 
 
Recovery by Helen Macdonald 
Therapy by Stephen Grosz

Family

Aldous Huxley

Could drugs offer a new way of seeing the world? In 1953, in the presence of an investigator, Aldous Huxley took four-tenths of a gramme of mescalin, sat down and waited to see what would happen. When he opened his eyes everything, from the flowers in a vase to the creases in his trousers, was transformed. His account of his experience, and his vision for all that psychedelics could offer to mankind, has influenced writers, artists and thinkers around the world. 
 
The unabridged text of The Doors of Perception by Aldous Huxley 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
Drinking by John Cheever 
Swimming by Roger Deakin 
Eating by Nigella Lawson 
Desire by Haruki Murakami

Psychedelics

Irvine Welsh

Irvine Welsh, 'poet laureate of the chemical generation', exposes the seamy underbelly of rave’s utopian dream. Lloyd, our permanently pilled-up protagonist, pushes his weekends to breaking point and beyond in this frazzled trip through Scottish clubland. He experiences the vertiginous uppers and downers of the Second Summer of Love, dabbles in a spot of disc jockeying and closes in, gradually, on some kind of redemption… 
 
Selected from Irvine Welsh's novel Ecstasy. 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
Home by Salman Rushdie 
Dreams by Sigmund Freud 
Eating by Nigella Lawson 
Work by Joseph Heller

Rave

Louisa May Alcott

Your sister might be the kindred soul who knows you best, or the most alien being in your household; she might enrage you or inspire you; she might be your fiercest competitor or closest co-conspirator, but she'll always share with you a totally unique bond. Meg, Jo, Beth and Amy are four of the most famous sisters in literature, and these stories of the joys and heartaches they share are a touching celebration of the special ties of sisterhood. 
 
Selected from the books Little Women and Good Wives by Louisa May Alcott 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
Fatherhood by Karl Ove Knausgaard 
Motherhood by Helen Simpson 
Babies by Anne Enright 
Love by Jeanette Winterson

Sisters

Arthur Conan Doyle

‘Well, Watson, we seem to have fallen upon evil days’ 
 
Sherlock Holmes: the quintessential British hero and the world's most popular detective. Through his powers of deduction, and with the help of his faithful companion Dr Watson, Holmes takes on all manner of devious criminals and dangerous villains – and wins. But the cases involving murder are the most dastardly of them all… 
 
Selected from The Complete Sherlock Holmes 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
 A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
 Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
 Power by William Shakespeare 
 Independence by Charlotte Bronte 
London by Charles Dickens

Murder

Toni Morrison

An exploration of race from one of the twentieth century’s primary chroniclers of the African American experience. 
 
Is who we are really only skin deep? In this searing, remonstrative book, Toni Morrison unravels race through the stories of those debased and dehumanised because of it. A young black girl longing for the blue eyes of white baby dolls spirals into inferiority and confusion. A friendship falls apart over a disputed memory. An ex-slave is haunted by a lonely, rebukeful ghost, bent on bringing their past home. Strange and unexpected, yet always stirring, Morrison’s writing on race sinks us deep into the heart and mind of our troubled humanity. 
 
 Includes selections from the books Song of Solomon, The Bluest Eye, Beloved by Toni Morrison 
 
‘She gave me permission to be unapologetically Black. She informed me of the power that resided in me. She validated me when the world questioned my humanity’ Angie Thomas, author of The Hate U Give 
 
 VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
 A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
 Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
 Sisters by Louisa May Alcott 
 Love by Jeanette Winterson 
 Babies by Anne Enright 
 Language by Xiaolu Guo

Race

Salman Rushdie

Salman Rushdie, a self-described ‘emigrant from one place and a newcomer in two’, explores the true meaning of home. Writing with insight, passion and humour, he looks at what it means to belong, whether roots are real and homelands imaginary, what it is like to reconfigure your past from fragments of memory and what happens when East meets West. 
 
Selected from the books Shame, Imaginary Homelands and East, West by Salman Rushdie 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
 Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
 Love by Jeanette Winterson 
Liberty by Virginia Woolf 
Race by Toni Morrison 
 Sisters by Louisa May Alcott

Home

Charles Dickens

‘Wealth and beggary, virtue and vice, repletion and the direst hunger, all treading on each other and crowding together’ 
 
Could any writer portray London better than Charles Dickens? Dickens knew the city inside out, walking the streets day and night, in all weathers, and drawing inspiration from everything he saw. The fog, the mud, the churning river, the clamour of church bells, and at every corner schemes of business or pleasure – this is Dickens’s London in the company of some of his most memorable characters. 
 
Selected from the work of Charles Dickens 
 
 VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
 A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
 Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
Murder by Arthur Conan Doyle 
Power by William Shakespeare 
Independence by Charlotte Bronte

London

Sebastian Faulks

A soldier falls asleep on duty and is threatened with being court-martialled. An officer lies in mud, fighting for his life and the life of his men. A young man walks across Waterloo Bridge, explosives in his rucksack, heart pounding. In this powerfully moving book, Faulks shows us the true face of war. These are stories of death and survival, of hope and despair, and of ordinary people whose lives will never be the same again. 
 
Selected from the books Birdsong, A Possible Life and A Week in December by Sebastian Faulks 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
Home by Salman Rushdie 
Fatherhood by Karl Ove Knausgaard 
Work by Joseph Heller 
Dreams by Sigmund Freud

Rose Tremain

What is the secret to true friendship? Is it really love’s quieter relation or something stronger and more profound? And where does the line between the two lie? Rose Tremain looks at two unlikely lifelong friendships, which – though tested – prove unbreakable. Thought-provoking and life-affirming, this is at once an examination and a celebration of friendship in all its glorious complexity. 
 
Selected from the books Restoration and The Gustav Sonata by Rose Tremain 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
Love by Jeanette Winterson 
Language by Xiaolu Guo 
Desire by Haruki Murakami 
Freedom by Margaret Atwood

Friendship

Xiaolu Guo

Have you ever tried to learn another language? When Zhuang first arrives in London from China she feels like she is among an alien species. The city is disorientating, the people unfriendly, the language a muddle of personal pronouns and moody verbs. But with increasing fluency in English surviving turns to living. And they say that the best way to learn a language is to fall in love with a native speaker… 
 
Selected from the book A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers by Xiaolu Guo 
 
 VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
 Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
Babies by Anne Enright 
 Depression by William Styron 
 Race by Toni Morrison 
 Home by Salman Rushdie

Language

Charlotte Brontë

‘To myself alone could I look’ 
 
Jane Eyre and Lucy Snowe are heroines who depend upon no one but themselves. In the face of hardship, from small sacrifices to great heartache, they cling resolutely to their principles of self-reliance. Lucy's energy and enterprise take her to Belgium and a career in teaching, whilst Jane’s honest, intelligent mind draws declarations of love. Both are the unforgettable creations of the deeply independent and brilliant Charlotte Brontë. 
 
Selected from Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre and Villette. 
 
 VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
 A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
 Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
 Sisters by Louisa May Alcott 
Freedom by Margaret Atwood 
Marriage by Jane Austen 
Liberty by Virginia Woolf

Independence

Helen Simpson

Enjoy Helen Simpson’s sharply funny, humane take on the everyday joys and struggles of motherhood in this perfect Mother’s Day gift. 
 
 Welcome to motherhood – a land of aching fatigue, constant self-sacrifice and thankless servitude, a land of bottomless devotion, small hands and feet like warm pink roses, and velvet kisses. Here is a land where men and women, once carefree and engrossed in work and sex, now try to solve age-old arguments and search fruitlessly for another hour in the day. Perhaps you know this land well, or perhaps you’re entering it for the first time – either way, you need these honest funny humane stories from an expert guide. 
 
Selected from Helen Simpson’s short story collections Dear George, Hey Yeah Right Get a Life and Constitutional 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
Language by Xiaolu Guo 
Fatherhood by Karl Ove Knausgaard 
Eating by Nigella Lawson 
Drinking by John Cheever

Motherhood

Haruki Murakami

You’ve just passed someone on the street who could be the love of your life, the person you’re destined for – what do you do? In Murakami’s world, you tell them a story. The five weird and wonderful tales collected here each unlock the many-tongued language of desire, whether it takes the form of hunger, lust, sudden infatuation or the secret longings of the heart. 
 
Selected from Haruki’s Murakami’s short story collections The Elephant Vanishes, Blind Willow Sleeping Woman, Men Without Women 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
 Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
 Love by Jeanette Winterson 
Psychedelics by Aldous Huxley 
Eating by Nigella Lawson 
Summer by Laurie Lee

Desire

John Cheever

What’s the worst another drink could do? John Cheever pours out our most sociable of vices, and hands it to us in a highball. From the calculating teenager who raids her parents’ liquor cabinet, only to drown her sorrows in it, to the suburban swimmer withering away with every plunge he takes, these are stories suffused with beauty, sadness, and the gathering storm of a bender well-done. Seen through the gin-lacquered looking glass of Cheever’s writing, your next drink may have you reaching for a lime and soda instead. 
 
Selected from the book Collected Stories by John Cheever 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
Swimming by Roger Deakin 
Eating by Nigella Lawson 
Calm by Tim Peaks 
Love by Jeanette Winterson

Drinking

Richard Wright

VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
How to go on in a world where everything is set against you? With hope? In fear? Or, in violent struggle? In this gripping and disturbing book, Richard Wright weaves his own childhood recollections with those of Bigger Thomas - a young black man trapped in a life of poverty in the slums of Chicago, and unwittingly involved in a wealthy woman's death - to paint a portrait of insurmountable oppression. Through the strange pride Bigger takes in his crime, Wright brings us to confront the systems of justice we blindly assume are always on our side. 
 
Selected from the books Black Boy and Native Son by Richard Wright

Injustice

Virginia Woolf

Why should one half be free to live, while the other is doomed to watch silently from the sidelines? In this visionary collection, Virginia Woolf leads us on a transformative journey through the liberating powers of the mind. From an exploration of why women were barred from writing and under what conditions they might break free, to the solace derived from haunting London's streets, these essays and stories present Woolf at her most impassioned, rendering the pursuit of liberty one of life's most poetic adventures. 
 
Selected from the books A Room of One's Own, The Waves and Street Haunting and Other Essays by Virginia Woolf 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
Love by Jeanette Winterson 
Home by Salman Rushdie 
Language by Xiaolu Guo 
Race by Toni Morrison

Liberty

Marcel Proust

Can we truly know the one we love? In this painfully candid book Marcel Proust looks straight into the green eye of every lover’s jealous struggle. He broods on why we are driven to try possess one another, how jealousy can outlive death, and whether we can ever reclaim those careless days of first love. There is no greater chronicler of jealousy’s darkest fears and destructive suspicions than Proust. 
 
Selected from the book In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
Desire by Haruki Murakami 
Eating by Nigella Lawson 
Home by Salman Rushdie 
Babies by Anne Enright

Jealousy

Karl Ove Knausgaard

Karl Ove Knausgaard explores the day to day realities of fatherhood in the ultimate literary gift for dads. 
 
 How to be a good father? 
 
 Children’s birthday parties, unsuccessful family holidays, humiliating antenatal music classes: the trials of parenthood are all found in Knausgaard’s compelling and honest account of family life. Contrasting moments of enormous love and tenderness towards his children with the boring struggles of domesticity, this is one father’s personal experience, and somehow, every father’s too. 
 
Selected from the book A Man in Love by Karl Ove Knausgaard 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
Desire by Haruki Murakami 
Babies by Anne Enright 
Eating by Nigella Lawson 
Language by Xiaolu Guo

Fatherhood

M. R. James

A high-pitched laugh echoes in an empty church. Servants discover their master dead in his bed, the only sign of disturbance an open window. The coffin of a woman hanged as a witch is found to be empty. A bed that hasn’t been slept in is crumpled and distressed come the morning. A skeletal figure creeps closer and closer to the house where an unsuspecting family lie sleeping. In these chilling tales of the supernatural, M. R. James proves he truly is the master of the ghost story. 
 
Selected from the book Ghost Stories by M.R. James 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
Drinking by John Cheever 
Summer by Laurie Lee 
Friendship by Rose Tremain 
Love by Jeanette Winterson

Ghosts

Margaret Atwood

Can we ever be wholly free? 
 
In this book of breathtaking imaginary leaps that conjure dystopias and magical islands, Margaret Atwood holds a mirror up to our own world. The reflection we are faced with, of men and women in prisons literal and metaphorical, is frightening, but it is also a call to arms to speak and to act to preserve our freedom while we still can. And in that, there is hope. 
 
Selected from The Handmaid’s Tale and Hag-Seed by Margaret Atwood. 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human

Freedom

Jane Austen

Why do we set so much store by marriage? Jane Austen was fascinated by this question, subjecting it to her forensic eye and wonderfully ironic wit again and again. Here are stolen glances and nervous advances, meddling parents and self-important cousins, society whisperings and the fluttering hearts of young lovers. All of them have their own views and expectations of marriage, and Austen’s are the wisest of all. 
 
Selected from the novels Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Northanger Abbey and Persuasion by Jane Austen. 
 
 VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
 A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human

Marriage

Simon Schama

‘Great art has dreadful manners… 
 
…The hushed reverence of the gallery can fool you into believing masterpieces are visions that soothe, charm and beguile, but actually they are thugs. Merciless and wily, the greatest paintings grab you in a headlock and proceed in short order to re-arrange your sense of reality.’ In inimitable style, our greatest historian and master storyteller Simon Schama makes an irresistible case for the power of art and its necessary place in our lives, examining art through the prism of the troubling life and works of Italian master painter, and murderer, Caravaggio. 
 
Selected from The Power of Art 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
Also in the Vintage Minis 'Great Ideas' series: 
Religion by Karen Armstrong 
Science by Ian McEwan

Oscar Wilde

‘The truth is rarely pure and never simple. Modern life would be very tedious if it were either, and modern literature a complete impossibility.’ 
 
Is lying simply an uncomfortable truth about life or something to be celebrated? In these dazzlingly witty pages we find deceptions of all kinds. From false names to imaginary friends to fictitious engagements, Wilde proves himself to be a connoisseur of creativity and argues that lying may be an art form in itself. 
 
Selected from The Importance of Being Earnest, The Decay of Lying and The Picture of Dorian Gray 
 
 VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
 A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
 Also in the Vintage Minis series: 
 Murder by Arthur Conan Doyle 
 Power by William Shakespeare 
 Jealousy by Marcel Proust 
 Ghosts by M. R. James

Lies

Ian McEwan

‘This is a history of intellectual courage, hard work, occasional inspiration and every conceivable form of human failing. It is also an extended invitation to wonder, to pleasure’ 
 
How far have we come in our understanding of the world around us? In this eye-opening collection, Ian McEwan looks back at the history of scientific discovery from Darwin to Dawkins as well as exploring, with brilliant originality, what a future with AI and climate change could hold for us. 
 
Selected from Solar, Enduring Love, Machines Like Me 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human 
 
Also in the Vintage Minis 'Great Ideas' series: 
Religion by Karen Armstrong 
Art by Simon Schama

Science

Various

Immerse yourself in a literary wonderland with this collection of timeless Christmas tales. 
 
'There seems a magic in the very name of Christmas’ said Charles Dickens. From yuletide carols to scrumptious food to presents under the tree, from cold winter nights in Victorian London to countryside festivities by the fire, from the melancholies of the season to the injustices, our best writers have seen it all and written it down. A Vintage Christmas captures the very essence of what Christmas means to us and what real magic can be found, written by some of the world’s finest authors, including Charles Dickens, Arthur Conan Doyle, Anthony Trollope, Laurie Lee, E. Nesbit and Alice Munro. 
 
 
Stories in A Vintage Christmas: 
‘Carol-Barking’ from Cider With Rosie by Laurie Lee 
‘Obadiah Oak, Mrs Griffiths and the Carol Singers’ by Louis de Bernières 
‘The Turkey Season’ by Alice Munro 
‘Christmas at Thompson Hall’ by Anthony Trollope 
‘Christmas Shopping’ from The Green Road by Anne Enright 
‘A Conscience Pudding’ from The New Treasure Seekers by E. Nesbit 
‘Christmas at Cold Comfort Farm’ by Stella Gibbons 
‘There Never Was Such a Goose’ from A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens 
‘Let Nothing You Dismay’ by Helen Simpson 
‘Christmas Is a Sad Season for the Poor’ by John Cheever 
‘A Serious Talk’ by Raymond Carver 
‘The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle’ by Arthur Conan Doyle 
 
VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
Vintage Minis bring you the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human – from birth to death and everything in between.

Showing results for: ‘Michael Symmons Roberts’

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