Affinities

'Brian Dillon is always invigoratingly brilliant. His sentences, his stylistic innovations, the range and potency of his intellectual adventures; he is a true master of the literary arts and a writer I would never hesitate to read, whatever his subject.' - Max Porter, author of Shy 'In Affinities, Brian Dillon has woven a sparking electric web of aesthetic attention, an astonishingly deft and slantwise autobiography through the images of others. With this third panel in his brilliant triptych - with Essayism and Suppose a Sentence - Dillon has made himself a quiet apostle of close looking, drawing such intimate connections between such disparate things that he reveals marvel after marvel, and miraculously passes his affinities along to the reader. His project, it seems to me, is a nearly holy one, borne of deep generosity and love for the world.' - Lauren Groff, author of Matrix 'Brian Dillon's essays match discernment and critical thinking with a sense of pleasure in finding a work of art that speaks to him and lures him into contemplating its mystery and intricacy. His writing is exact and calm; rather than explain he explores, playing what is tentative against what is certain.' - Colm Toibin, author of The Magician 'Dillon is a mournful, witty and original writer.' - Parul Sehgal, New York Times 'Dillon is a literary flaneur in the tradition of Baudelaire and Walter Benjamin.' - John Banville, Irish Times 'Brian Dillon is one of the true treasures of contemporary literature - a critic and essayist of unmatched style, sensitivity and purpose.' - Mark O'Connell, author of Notes from an Apocalypse