The Guardian view on Bridget Jones and Tom Ripley: characters that speak across time
Leo Woodall to join Renée Zellweger and Hugh Grant for Bridget Jones 4
February 2023
Top 10s
Top 10 cads in fiction
Dangerously handsome young men carelessly ruining women’s lives are a rarer breed than they were. But their hatefulness still makes compelling reading
December 2021
Christmas parties that never happened: the best festive revels in literature
With ‘fictional’ Christmas parties in the news, it seemed only right to pick out for Boris Johnson some other festive shindigs that were figments of the imagination
June 2021
On the Road to Bridget Jones: five books that define each generation
Blake Morrison on boomers, Chris Power on Gen X, Megan Nolan on millennials and Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé on Gen Z … which books shaped your generation?
April 2021
Bridget Jones’s Diary at 20: a gloriously messy ode to imperfection
While elements of the hit British comedy have aged quite notably, the charm remains as strong as ever as does Renee Zellweger’s Oscar-nominated turn
December 2020
TV review
Being Bridget Jones review – a sense of humour that came to define an era
No buts: Keir Starmer did not inspire Helen Fielding's Mark Darcy
July 2020
I can’t believe the sexism in Bridget Jones’s world, says Helen Fielding
Twenty five years on, the creator of the love-lorn, diet-crazed journalist is shocked by all the bum and boob jokes aimed at her heroine while at work – experiences based on the author’s life
June 2020
My favourite film aged 12
My favourite film aged 12: Bridget Jones's Diary
Garrulous and inappropriate, Renée Zellweger’s heroine drove home the farce of impossible, gendered standards. I couldn’t have had a better guide for my teen years
April 2020
Book clinic
Book clinic: are there any books as clever and amusing as Bridget Jones?
Novelist Emma Jane Unsworth selects some of the best titles to get you laughing out loud
February 2020
British Book awards balance art and selling power to decide best writer in 30 years
Novelists rub shoulders with presidents, chefs, comedians and thriller megastars on longlist to define the title with the biggest impact on the book world
January 2020
Shortcuts
Was Mark Darcy based on Keir Starmer? Here’s the definitive answer
The clean-cut candidate for Labour-leader may suit the part of the Bridget Jones character, but is it a truth universally acknowledged?
December 2017
Turkey roast to turkish delight: 10 fictional feasts for Christmas
Many writers find food for thought in the holiday season, whether it is Charles Dickens’s turkey roast or CS Lewis’s turkish delight
August 2017
Top 10s
Top 10 parties in fiction
From Bridget Jones’s curry calamity to Vanity Fair’s historic ball, these social dramas have inspired many novelists. You are invited to enjoy 10 favourites
May 2017
The Guardian Books podcast
Hay festival 2017: Cory Doctorow, Helen Fielding and Shashi Tharoor – podcast
We gaze uneasily to the future with Doctorow, look back on the history of the British Raj with Tharoor, and some comic relief comes from Fielding’s hapless heroine Bridget Jones
Helen Fielding says Bridget Jones books are not anti-feminist
Fielding says humour is a ‘very powerful tool’ and describes being able to laugh at yourself a mark of strength, not a weakness
Bridget Jones's Baby wins Helen Fielding a pig – and the Wodehouse prize
The fourth novel about the hapless romantic heroine wins the UK’s only award for comic writing
December 2016
Christmas chaos in literature, from Emma to Adrian Mole
Forget Dickensian happy endings, the real Christmas classics tell stories of fraught family gatherings, orgies of consumption and festivities for one, writes John Mullan
October 2016
Gillon Aitken obituary
Leading British literary agent whose clients included Germaine Greer, Helen Fielding, AN Wilson and Salman Rushdie
