Christine Purdon reviews Lennard J. Davis's Obsession: A History for the THES, 8 January.

Robert Mills reviews Derek G. Neal's The Masculine Self in Late Medieval England for the THES, 8 January.

John Guy,"Shakespeare and deep England," TLS, 7 January, reviews Jonathan Bate's Soul of the Age: The life, mind and world of William Shakespeare .

Laurence Rees reviews Philipp von Boeselager's Valkyrie, Hans Mommsen's Germans Against Hitler and Ian Kershaw's Luck of the Devil for the London Times, 4 January.

Tony Badger,"FDR: A Model for Obama?" The Nation, 7 January, reminds us of how unprepared Roosevelt was for the crisis that faced him.