How much have our perceptions of reading and writing changed now that you can craft a novel on a laptop and scroll through it on a Nintendo games console? This Christmas could be the moment when our idea of curling up with a fat novel are transformed for ever, says Tim Adams.  "In the pre-internet age...," he observes, "there came a moment when you turned off the TV or the stereo, or put down the book or magazine… You stopped doing culture and you withdrew --- or advanced --- into your solitude. You used the phone. You went for a walk. You went to the corner bar for a drink. You made love... You wrote a letter.

A very interesting look into life after a gold medal especially in sports that do not draw big groups of spectators or sponsors. "We tend to forget that for those who have spent their lives chasing a single, all-but-impossible, goal, achieving it leaves a void. ... "You don't plan for the next day." ... For athletes who have known no other life but full-time training, it can be hard to picture a future beyond the locker room. Many will have forgone university or other higher education. Only a lucky few will find roles in coaching or commentating; the others must start new careers from scratch."

"One understands that Channel 4 are under huge economic pressure. I just hope the people in charge of Channel 4 and those in the government who are responsible for Channel 4 realise the enormous value culturally they're getting from £10m a year."

"... young middle-class professionals with good degrees and diplomas are facing a lifetime on low salaries with unrewarding jobs, forever poorer than their parents."

"We may look back at the second half of the last century as an era of cheap food. It'll be like the Hundred Years' War, as we were taught it in school: a seminal moment in human history that's gone and will not return."

Article on Arcade Fire. "Paul Morley discovers the secret of this special group's magic in their most intimate interview ever"

One of the most exciting British movies this year is Danny Boyle's sci-fi epic, Sunshine, which puts the divine back into a genre that had lost its way.

Few in publishing inspire more fear than the head buyer of Waterstone's. Which is bad news for lovers of literature - or even old-fashioned browsers, says Tim Adams