Scribble, Scribble, Scribble: Writing on Ice Cream, Obama, Churchill and My Mother, By Simon Schama

Have opinions – will travel

In 1980, Martin Amis penned a memorable profile of Anthony Burgess for The Observer in which he imagined a typical afternoon in the life of the author: "Burgess ... wrote two book reviews, a flute concerto and a film treatment, knocked off his gardening column for Pravda, phoned in his surfing page to the Sydney Morning Herald, and then test-drove a kidney dialysis machine for El Pais before settling down to some serious work."

I was put in mind of Amis's article by this collection of Simon Schama's recent journalism, which reveals a writer of truly Burgessian versatility. A professor of history by trade, Schama has frequently been lured from academia's ivory tower by what he calls the "hot metal romance" of demotic hackery, and has turned his hand to an impressive range, from the book review and political essay to the cookery column and showbiz interview. Included here, among sundry jeux d'esprit, are a survey of Isaiah Berlin's wartime correspondence, an amusing portrait of Charlotte Rampling and a sharply observed account of a transatlantic cruise.

There is, no doubt, a whiff of self-indulgence about this volume, and I can't be the only one to find that awkward title rather too eager to portray Schama as a playful polymath. Then again, how can one resist a book that offers both an excursus on Thomas Carlyle's prose and a paean to the "gloppy glory" of beef stew? Tuck in and enjoy.