蜜芽传媒

Wolf Moon is an elegant exploration of the night, which considers how the darkness is understood as a time for nightmares and fear, especially for women. The reader is Manjinder Virk.

In her new book, Arifa Akbar looks at the fearfulness invoked by murderous predators like the nineteenth century's Ripper, and of what it means to be a homeless woman when night falls. Yet, she reminds us that the night is also full of beauty and possibility. It's a time for joy and for fun, and so she takes us to London's Theatreland and to a hedonistic nightclub in Berlin, by contrast, she invites us to a convent where an order of nuns wake at the midnight to sing their elegiac prayers for the world. In Svalbard, we experience a place where night is absent and perpetual daytime proves unsettling. In sum, Wolf Moon is a reflective and thoughtful consideration of what happens after the sun has set.

Arifa Akbar is a theatre critic, a trustee of the Orwell Foundation and English PEN. She is currently a fellow of the London Centre for the Humanities. Her first book, is the acclaimed memoir, Consumed.

Abridged by Katrin Williams
Produced by Elizabeth Allard