Blake spent over fifteen years working part-time or full-time as a literary editor, and published a good deal of journalism – mostly book reviews – in that period. Since 1995, he has been writing full-time, and has published features on (among other subjects) children, football, cannabis, the BNP, care of the elderly, the Soham murders, 9/11, the Iraq war and ‘the other Blake Morrison’, his American namesake.
As a literary editor, Blake worked for The Times Literary Supplement (1978-81), the Observer (1981-89), and the Independent on Sunday (1989-95). He has also contributed articles to the New Yorker, the London Review of Books, the New Statesman, the New York Times and Poetry Review. Some of his essays and reviews appear in his 1999 collection Too True.
Articles and reviews