Category: Iain M Banks

Western Intelligence & the Worship of Chaos

Ars Notoria, 17th October 202516th February 2026

Ruins of Beit Lahia, in the Gaza Strip, destroyed by Israeli bombardments, photo Jaber Jehad Badwan By Richard Steinhardt The story of Bletchley Park’s recruitment is indicative. They didn’t use a Mensa test. Instead, they placed an extremely cryptic crossword puzzle in the newspaper and invited in the people who…

‘It’s delightful! Very, very funny … Anyone with a true sense of him should find it wholly engaging!’

Stephen Fry

What would Oscar Wilde make of modern day Britain? And what would modern day Britain make of a latter day Oscar Wilde?

In this beautifully illustrated graphic novel, Dan Pearce brings the celebrated and notorious Victorian wit a century into the future, with great humour and a Wildean sense of mischief in his own right.

“J. W. Wood’s stories evince a gift for the quotidian, employing brilliant conceits and mischievous turns of phrase which enrich the writing at every point. Capturing the frustration of curtailed lives and the grim horrors of the corporate world, Wood presents a meta-fictional universe in which the rich realise their folly and we control computers, not the other way round.”

—Julian Stannard, award-winning poet and author of The University of Bliss (Sagging Meniscus Press, USA, 2024)

That Was Hugo Blythe MP is the professional journal, presented in diary form, of government researcher Alaric Casteele. Casteele’s diary is a skilful interchange between events in his domestic life, and his meticulous eavesdropping into the political intrigues levelled against his boss Hugo Blythe, a government minister pivotal in the New Labour project, climaxing as a general election approaches.

Delightful, informative and sceptical – but never cynical – The Rights of Man And Fish nods to Voltaire, Günter Grass and Paul Torday’s Salmon Fishing in the Yemen, while maintaining a humour and breadth of vision entirely its own. Join Gisella as she finds out what makes the ideal society based on what she learns from a millennium of human error, intrigue and haute cuisine. Wittily illustrated by Pete Field, this work is a tour de force.

Congratulations to one of our regular contributors, Andy Hall, for winning the prestigious Trieste Photo Days award for best author. The competitions was judged by the renowned photographer Harry Gruyaert, who said:

'I chose this work because it's the kind of work I would have liked to have taken myself. His compositions stand out; he's pulling order from chaos and some of these images are truly powerful.'

Prospero in his cell busy indwelling, might have time to ponder the mystery of the myth that is Bob Dylan. He is concealed behind a dark blue velvet curtain embroidered in gold; Dylan with a megaphone standing on a stool, blown up from Minnesota.

Phil Hall

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© AN Editions 2025. All rights reserved. Materials on this website are free to download for personal use but must not be publicly disseminated, re-published or broadcast without permission. To seek permission, please use the Contact page of this website, or contact the author, artist, or photographer directly. No representation, warranty or covenant, whether express or implied, is made as to the accuracy of any information or statements contained in the Ars Notoria Magazine and AN Editions shall have no liability of any nature whatsoever for any inaccuracies.

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