Pedro and Ricky Come Again - Selected Writing 19882020

Thirty years ago Jonathan Meades published a hefty collection of reportorial journalism, essays, criticism, squibs, fictions called Peter Knows What Dick Likes. It quickly acquired cult status. The critic James Woods was moved to write: ‘When journalism is like this, journalism and literature become one.’

This new collection is every bit as rich and every bit as catholic. Hence its title: Pedro and Ricky Come Again. Thirty years older, so no longer boys, but no wiser, and still impervious to good taste and good manners.

From the inexcusability of nationalism and the ubiquitous abuse of the word ‘iconic’, to John Lennon’s shopping lists and the wine they call ‘Black Tower’, the work assembled here demonstrates Meades''s unparalleled range and erudition, with pieces on cities, artists, sex, England, concrete, politics and much, much more.