Like a rolling ode: academic conference weighs up Bob Dylan’s poetic licence
Seven Ages of Dylan event at Bristol University sees professors discuss whether musician should be considered a poet
Bafta TV special/Trevor McDonald: The anchor
Tom Lamont salutes his favourite newsreader who joins Anthony Hopkins, Melvyn Bragg and Judi Dench as a Bafta fellow
Egyptian novelist hails revolution as a ‘great human achievement’
The country's most celebrated writer, Alaa al-Aswany, was inspired by the Tahrir protesters, but fears a counter-revolution
Turkey’s turn to stand up for William Burroughs
Elif Shafak: A Turkish publisher is being indicted by the paternalistic state for translating a Burroughs book that 'lacks narrative unity'
The Origins of Political Order by Francis Fukuyama – review
Francis Fukuyama was once a favourite of the US right. His new book, however, is a historical survey showing why the anti-state instincts of the Tea Party movement are wrong, writes Will Hutton
Apocalypse now? Christian Rapture fiction and the end of the world
David Barnett: As a US broadcaster predicts Earth's imminent demise, this SF-influenced genre has long been warning us what to expect
Philip Roth is one of the great artists of the novel, warts and all
Jonathan Jones: Carmen Callil says he goes 'on and on about the same subject'. I call it a particular landscape of memory and imagination
Book World Prague was right to honour Saudi Arabia
Mohammed Hasan Alwan: My country may not be a bastion of free speech, but its writers need international support to continue to move things forward
In praise of… Abdo Khal
Editorial: Acclaimed author shines a light on life at the bottom of the heap in Saudi Arabia's often forgotten villages
How can a book fair make Saudi Arabia ‘guest of honour’?
Alice Guthrie: Book World Prague 2011 has laid on a lavish welcome for Saudi Arabia, but there's scant room for the writers the Saudi government persecutes
Italy shuts out Sex and the Vatican
John Hooper: A book about priests' sex lives, their mistresses and their children has been met in Italy with a wall of embarrassed silence
Newt Gingrich, Amazon explorer
Lindesay Irvine: The Amazon profile of the former speaker Newt Gingrich reveals a liking for fictional terror, but which politicians would you like to see moonlighting as literary reviewers?
Disappearing world: 100 places under threat from climate change
A new book highlights 100 areas of the planet that could vanish because of global warming – and encourages us to visit them before they do
Karl Marx, part 6: The economics of power
Peter Thompson: Marx is often accused of reducing humans to mere expendable specks of matter within the greater economic scheme of things