Samuel Beckett’s second published novel, Murphy, opens with the eponymous protagonist having tied himself naked and with seven scarves to his rocking chair, swinging back and forth in the dark of his room. With this ritual Beckett’s well read, intellectual character retreats from everyday reality, relieves his body to set his mind free: ‘for it was not until his body is appeased that he could come alive in his mind’.2... Read more

Our relationship to the architectural modernity of the last 150 years grows increasingly attenuated. How much has changed in just a few decades! Buildings once touted for their absolute newness survive in our sprawling, chaotic cities like ageing grandparents, posing irksome problems: how to maintain them? how to afford them? can they accommodate contemporary needs? can we contrive new uses to justify their existence?... Read more