Ian Penman (born 1959) is a British writer, music journalist and critic. He began his career as a writer for the New Musical Express in 1977, later contributing to various publications including Uncut, Sight & Sound, The Wire, The Face, and The Guardian. He has published two collections of his essays and articles, plus full-length studies of filmmaker Rainer Werner Fassbinder, for which he won the Ondaatje Prize and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize, and of composer Erik Satie.

Biography

Penman was born in Wiltshire, UK, in 1959. He spent much of his childhood abroad in the Middle East and Africa, returning to Norfolk in 1970. Penman began writing for prominent British music magazine the New Musical Express (NME) in the autumn of 1977. Much of Penman's writing reflected his involvement in the nascent post-punk scene developing in London in the late 1970s.

Along with fellow NME writers such as Paul Morley and Barney Hoskyns, Penman developed a style of music criticism influenced by critical theory, philosophy and other art mediums that was often experimental in its prose.

In 2023, he published a study of filmmaker Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Fassbinder: Thousands of Mirrors. The book was joint winner of the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Biography and won the Ondaatje Prize.

In 2025, Penman published a study of composer Erik Satie, Erik Satie Three Piece Suite.

Influence

Penman has been cited as an influence by range of writers and theorists, including Simon Reynolds, Kodwo Eshun, and Mark Fisher. In addition, artists such as Simon Raymonde of Cocteau Twins have cited Penman's writing as an inspiration.

Books

  • Vital Signs: Music, Movies, and Other Manias. (1998, Serpent's Tail).
  • It Gets Me Home, This Curving Track (2019, Fitzcarraldo Editions)
  • Fassbinder: Thousands of Mirrors (2023, Fitzcarraldo Editions)
  • Erik Satie Three Piece Suite (2025, Fitzcarraldo Editions)

References

  • Ian Penman's Blogspot (archived; last updated in 2006)
  • Ian Penman chronology in Rock's Backpages
  • Ian Penman on Diamanda Galás
  • Announcement of It Gets Me Home, This Curving Track