Creative

In five Essays, Rachel Cooke (1969-2025) takes a wry and wide-ranging look at disappointment. She believes life is full of let downs, the 'twenty first century world seems expressly to set us up' for them. From a cup of coffee to new clothes, highly anticipated pleasures often prove to be an anti-climax.

In this episode, she takes a look at artistic disappointment from 19th century artist Benjamin Haydon, whose attempts to stage a grand exhibition were thwarted by the far more popular 'General Tom Thumb', to the contemporary writer whose book event is - disappointingly - empty. Creative disappointment, which often follows years of solitary work, is, Rachel feels, one of the worst kinds.