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The Atlantic Ocean: Reports from Britain and America
For over two decades, Andrew O'Hagan has been publishing critical essays in celebrated periodicals on both sides of the Atlantic--among them The London Review of Books, The New York Review of Books, The Guardian and other publications. The Atlantic Ocean highlights the best of his clear-eyed, brilliant work, beginning with an essay tracing the "special relationship" between Britain and America since the days of Margaret Thatcher and ending with an extraordinary piece about the lives, and deaths, of Guardsman Anthony Wakefield and US Marine Corporal Lieutenant Colonel John C. Spahr, who both died in Iraq on May 2, 2005. O'Hagan's subjects range from the rise of the tabloids to the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, to the trajectory of the Beatles and the impossibility of not fancying Marilyn Monroe.
The Atlantic Ocean is a fascinating, important, and timely collection.
- GenresEssaysNonfiction
368 pages, Hardcover
First published June 5, 2008
About the author
Andrew O'Hagan
47 books829 followersAndrew O'Hagan, FRSL (born 1968) is a Scottish novelist and non-fiction author.
He is the author of the novels Our Fathers, Personality, and Be Near Me, longlisted for the Man Booker Prize. His work has appeared in the London Review of Books, the New York Review of Books, The New Yorker, and The Guardian (UK). In 2003, O’Hagan was named one of Granta’s Best Young British Novelists. He lives in London, England.
He is the author of the novels Our Fathers, Personality, and Be Near Me, longlisted for the Man Booker Prize. His work has appeared in the London Review of Books, the New York Review of Books, The New Yorker, and The Guardian (UK). In 2003, O’Hagan was named one of Granta’s Best Young British Novelists. He lives in London, England.
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
January 23, 2013
Essays from both sides of the Ocean
Andrew O’Hagan is from Glasgow but has written extensively about the US and the UK. His essays are extraordinary. He touches on mundane as well as profound current events and the essays date from the early ‘90’s to the present. Best of all he ties his topics to authors and their works.
There’s one called “England’s Flowers”. In it he discusses how English flowers are considered to be. A quote, “The people of that country breathed flowers in their sleep….flowers put them in mind of who they like to be; the old houses, the old soil. But what is the Elizabethan garden now? The Empire is gone: There’s more of the world in England now than there is of England in the world.”
It’s tempting to keep quoting O’Hagan because his writing is so darn good. Don’t worry. I won’t. He touches on topics from England’s and America’s past as well our present. Some of these include Marilyn Monroe, Andy Warhol, murder, terrorism but literature is always lurking somewhere nearby. The article concerning hurricane Katrina is hopeful and devastating in equal measure, just as it’s equally comic and tear inducing. The two essays I enjoyed the most were about writers E.M. Forster and William Styron. I now see these two writers from a new perspective. As an American I found a few pieces obscure since I hadn’t ‘lived’ through their details but still interesting. O’Hagan’s writing is incredible. I kept reminding myself this collection represents the best of his work but no matter how cherry picked they were there’s no doubt about O’Hagan’s talent.
This review is based on an e-galley provided by the publisher.
Andrew O’Hagan is from Glasgow but has written extensively about the US and the UK. His essays are extraordinary. He touches on mundane as well as profound current events and the essays date from the early ‘90’s to the present. Best of all he ties his topics to authors and their works.
There’s one called “England’s Flowers”. In it he discusses how English flowers are considered to be. A quote, “The people of that country breathed flowers in their sleep….flowers put them in mind of who they like to be; the old houses, the old soil. But what is the Elizabethan garden now? The Empire is gone: There’s more of the world in England now than there is of England in the world.”
It’s tempting to keep quoting O’Hagan because his writing is so darn good. Don’t worry. I won’t. He touches on topics from England’s and America’s past as well our present. Some of these include Marilyn Monroe, Andy Warhol, murder, terrorism but literature is always lurking somewhere nearby. The article concerning hurricane Katrina is hopeful and devastating in equal measure, just as it’s equally comic and tear inducing. The two essays I enjoyed the most were about writers E.M. Forster and William Styron. I now see these two writers from a new perspective. As an American I found a few pieces obscure since I hadn’t ‘lived’ through their details but still interesting. O’Hagan’s writing is incredible. I kept reminding myself this collection represents the best of his work but no matter how cherry picked they were there’s no doubt about O’Hagan’s talent.
This review is based on an e-galley provided by the publisher.
December 16, 2012
I did enjoy these essays-well-written and thought-provoking but kind of hard work-I had to pace myself and read this around other books.my advice would be give yourself a decent pause after each article to let it sink in before starting the next one.
July 14, 2023
"For more than two decades, Andrew O'Hagan has been publishing celebrated essays on both sides of the Atlantic. The Atlantic Ocean highlights the best of his clear-eyed, brilliant work, including his first published essay, a reminiscence of his working-class Scottish upbringing; an extraordinary piece about the lives of two soldiers, one English, one American, both of whom died in Iraq on May 2, 2005; and a piercing examination of the life of William Styron. O'Hagan's subjects range from the rise of the tabloids to the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, from the trajectory of the Beatles to the impossibility of not fancying Marilyn Monroe.
"The Atlantic Ocean -- an engrossing and important collection."
I wasn't prepared for this book. Reports from Britain and America is the subtitle and somehow I thought the book would be essays comparing and contrasting life in Britain and America. I suppose in a way they do, but basically they are very thoughtful forays into particular events, or people, or cultural phenomena. they don't compare or contrast -- they deal with a particular subject.
The essays were interesting and extremely well-written, but in my heart of hearts I still wish they'd been comparing and contrasting life in Britain and America.
"The Atlantic Ocean -- an engrossing and important collection."
I wasn't prepared for this book. Reports from Britain and America is the subtitle and somehow I thought the book would be essays comparing and contrasting life in Britain and America. I suppose in a way they do, but basically they are very thoughtful forays into particular events, or people, or cultural phenomena. they don't compare or contrast -- they deal with a particular subject.
The essays were interesting and extremely well-written, but in my heart of hearts I still wish they'd been comparing and contrasting life in Britain and America.
November 12, 2021
Fascinating how different are the Faber edition and the Mariner/Houghton Mifflin edition of this book. The U.S. version omits the author's introduction, a great piece about writing and journalism, not to mention the strange bromance of the UK and U.S. in the Thatcher/Reagan/Clinton/Bush/Bush/Blair years. It also drops the first essay of the Faber edition, "Scotland's Old Injury." Why leave out a great piece about Scotland by a great Scottish writer? Are we too provincial in the States to be interested in the tortured workings of Scotland's self-identity? (Don't answer that, please.) Even the subtitles are different: UK: Essays on Britain and America; U.S.: Reports from Britain and America. Two countries divided by a common language? Fortunately, both editions include some of the best journalism about Britain and America of the last 20 or so years, including the heartbreaking "After Hurricane Katrina."
June 4, 2017
What a superb writer this man is........ And such a truth teller - almost prescient in his wise debate... An example: Taken from the Intro - He is discussing the relationship between the USA and Britain - "We share many things and I have always believed in our Brotherhood, which is why it is sad to see us fall hopelessly together into that element that Scott Fitzgerald knew by heart: an utterly terrible grandness of delusion."
Bear in mind this book of essays was published in 2008!
I cannot praise this man enough - to me he is a light in the darkness....
If you want intelligence and brilliance - not to mention prose for the ages - then read - read him and recognise what real journalism is....
Bear in mind this book of essays was published in 2008!
I cannot praise this man enough - to me he is a light in the darkness....
If you want intelligence and brilliance - not to mention prose for the ages - then read - read him and recognise what real journalism is....
July 26, 2021
Interesting collection of articles from a very good writer.
April 11, 2026
These various essays vary in intensity. They were all good. some were sad others just made me mad. see the Bulger killing. All in all, good reading. I will expand on this later.
January 27, 2016
I first heard of Andrew O’Hagan the way most people probably did, from reading his brilliant profile on Julian Assange which was published in the London Review of Books in February 2014. O’Hagan was contracted as Assange’s ghostwriter for an autobiography which never ended up happening, but it meant he became close to the man in 2011 and 2012, before he went into the Ecuadorian embassy, and the resulting profile is probably one of the best analyses of a living person I’ve ever read. Neither sympathetic nor unsympathetic, it’s a deep, thoughtful and above all sincere analysis of a person – the kind of piece only a novelist could write.
I read a lot of O’Hagan’s other pieces after that, because he has a good and honest writing style and is unafraid to inject his own biases and opinions; I also noted that one of his novels was longlisted for the 2015 Booker. The Atlantic Ocean is just something I picked up because it was on sale at Readings, and despite the thematic linking of America and Europe in its title, it’s a mostly unconnected collection of essays O’Hagan published between the early 1990s and mid-2000s. They cover topics ranging across British farming, Marilyn Monroe, the assassination of JFK, begging, Michael Jackson, George Bush, and dozens of others.
There’s a clear-cut difference between the essays in which O’Hagan discusses things from a distance – often the sort of extensive reviews the LRB publishes when it really wants to discuss a broader issue through the lens of a couple of books – and those in which he draws on his own life experiences and puts himself firmly into the story. The latter are usually far more interesting; there’s a solid piece about the murder of James Bulger in which he reflects on how violent and cruel children can be, and another comparing the lives of two soldiers (one American, one British) who both died on the same day in Iraq. There’s also a piece on Hurricane Katrina, in which he follows a pair of Southern men who want to travel to Louisiana to help people, and in which he curiously keeps himself out of the narrative entirely despite being right there working with them in the disaster zone. I prefer essays by anybody, I think, to involve a personal element; there’s no such thing as a truly disengaged journalist.
Overall this collection mostly fell flat for me, but I think I’ll read one of his novels. And if you never got around to reading his piece on Julian Assange when it got all that buzz two years ago, I thoroughly recommend it.
I read a lot of O’Hagan’s other pieces after that, because he has a good and honest writing style and is unafraid to inject his own biases and opinions; I also noted that one of his novels was longlisted for the 2015 Booker. The Atlantic Ocean is just something I picked up because it was on sale at Readings, and despite the thematic linking of America and Europe in its title, it’s a mostly unconnected collection of essays O’Hagan published between the early 1990s and mid-2000s. They cover topics ranging across British farming, Marilyn Monroe, the assassination of JFK, begging, Michael Jackson, George Bush, and dozens of others.
There’s a clear-cut difference between the essays in which O’Hagan discusses things from a distance – often the sort of extensive reviews the LRB publishes when it really wants to discuss a broader issue through the lens of a couple of books – and those in which he draws on his own life experiences and puts himself firmly into the story. The latter are usually far more interesting; there’s a solid piece about the murder of James Bulger in which he reflects on how violent and cruel children can be, and another comparing the lives of two soldiers (one American, one British) who both died on the same day in Iraq. There’s also a piece on Hurricane Katrina, in which he follows a pair of Southern men who want to travel to Louisiana to help people, and in which he curiously keeps himself out of the narrative entirely despite being right there working with them in the disaster zone. I prefer essays by anybody, I think, to involve a personal element; there’s no such thing as a truly disengaged journalist.
Overall this collection mostly fell flat for me, but I think I’ll read one of his novels. And if you never got around to reading his piece on Julian Assange when it got all that buzz two years ago, I thoroughly recommend it.
September 3, 2009
A good selection of essays and thoughts. Most touching is the essay about begging and about farming. It's a good book to lift off the shelf browse and reflect upon.
May 12, 2016
Some excellent, measured, thoughtful and very reasonable personal essays here. I really like O'Hagan's writing. Smart and interesting. Great topics.
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July 19, 2016not like the Pacific
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews