Jessica Mitford’s Handbag

Jessica Mitford’s Handbag

Author: The London Review of Books February 4, 2026 Duration: 50:44
When Jessica Mitford (aka Decca) was eleven, in 1928, she opened a Running Away Account at Drummonds Bank. A few years later she ran away to Spain to help in the fight against Franco, and not long after that moved to the US where she became a naturalised citizen and joined the Communist Party. The Mitford sisters wrote many books and even more have been written about them, but Carla Kaplan's scholarly new biography of Jessica is a welcome addition to the ‘Mitford industry’, according to Rosemary Hill, because she approaches her subject as an ‘American communist with an unusual background in the English aristocracy’. In this episode, Rosemary joins Thomas Jones to talk about Decca’s eventful life, her work as a civil rights activist and writer, and her complicated relationships with the other Mitfords. When asked whether the bond with her sisters had ‘stood between her and life’s cruel circumstances’, Decca replied: ‘Sisters were life’s cruel circumstances.’ Find further reading on the episode page: https://lrb.me/mitfordpod Listen and subscribe to Rosemary Hill’s Close Readings series: In Apple Podcasts: https://lrb.me/applesignuplr In other podcast apps: https://lrb.me/scsignuplr From the LRB Subscribe to the LRB: ⁠⁠https://lrb.me/subslrbpod Close Readings podcast: ⁠https://lrb.me/crlrbpod⁠ LRB Audiobooks: ⁠https://lrb.me/audiobookslrbpod⁠ Bags, binders and more at the LRB Store: ⁠https://lrb.me/storelrbpod⁠ Get in touch: podcasts@lrb.co.uk

Each week, The LRB Podcast extends the long-form, inquisitive spirit of the London Review of Books into a conversational format. Hosts Thomas Jones and Malin Hay guide discussions that delve into the essays and ideas animating Europe’s leading magazine of culture and ideas, creating a space where complex thoughts on society, art, history, and literature are explored with depth and clarity. The rhythm of the podcast includes a dedicated fortnightly episode, ‘On Politics,’ hosted by James Butler, which sharpens the focus on the political forces and theories shaping our current moment. Listening feels like joining a nuanced, ongoing conversation where arguments are carefully constructed and perspectives are challenged. It’s a natural companion for anyone who believes that understanding the world requires patience, critical thinking, and engaging dialogue. The podcast doesn’t offer quick takes but rather thoughtful excavations of the week’s most compelling cultural and intellectual questions, mirroring the publication’s commitment to serious and elegant prose. This is where written criticism finds its voice, allowing listeners to immerse themselves in the debates that define our time.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 100

The LRB Podcast
Podcast Episodes
Caravaggio’s Bodies [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 43:56
In the 1590s, Caravaggio was one of ‘the swaggering, violent young men who terrorised Romans’, Erin Maglaque wrote recently in the LRB, and he ‘made his name by painting this violent, chaotic world’. On this episode, Eri…
On Politics: The Rearmament Consensus [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:05:41
‘We must build our hard power because that is the currency of the age,’ Keir Starmer declared to the Munich Security Conference earlier this month. It’s a sentiment shared across Europe, where leaders have cited Russia’s…
Early Modern News [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 45:03
‘Information in the early modern world could move no faster than the bodies that carried it,’ John Gallagher wrote recently in the LRB. For a horse and rider, that was just under fifteen kilometres per hour. Yet postal s…
On Politics: Mandelson and the Private Life of Power [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:06:49
When Peter Mandelson was a minister in Gordon Brown’s government he passed confidential advice to Jeffrey Epstein, who had recently been convicted of procuring a child for prostitution. This is among the many extraordina…
On Politics: A New Age of Protest in Iran [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 57:13
The protests that began in Iran last month have been suppressed with a level of state violence not seen since the 1980s, when the Islamic Republic executed thousands of leftists and other dissidents. In this episode, Ada…
Buckley, MAGA’s Patron Saint [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 47:30
‘Anti-communist​ dandy, scourge of Ivy League administrators, magazine chieftain, amanuensis to Joe McCarthy, father-confessor of the Nixon White House, Ronald Reagan consigliere: is it any wonder that William F. Buckley…
On Politics: Venezuela and the Trump Doctrine [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:01:35
In early January, the US military seized Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro, in a display of force that echoed its numerous past interventions in Latin America. Yet in this case, Trump’s justifications for the action…
Will the AI bubble burst? [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 54:58
‘Is it a bubble?’ John Lanchester asked in a recent LRB of the colossal amounts of money pouring into AI firms. ‘Of course it’s a bubble. The salient questions are how we got here, and what happens next.’ On this episode…
What Don Quixote Knew [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:05:25
In The Man Behind the Curtain, a bonus Close Readings series for 2026, Tom McCarthy and Thomas Jones examine great novels in terms of the systems and infrastructures at work in them. For their first episode, they turn to…
What Dickens taught Mariah Carey [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 34:51
Did Dickens ruin Christmas? He was certainly a pioneer in exploiting its commercial potential. A Christmas Carol sold 6,000 copies in five days when it was published on 19 December 1843, and Dickens went on to write four…