Long life
When I got married 50 years ago, my wife and I had somehow acquired a little cookery book called Cooking…
Long life
The arrival of spring is not an unmitigated joy. The warmth is nice, of course, as are the fresh leaves…
Long life
There was something poignant about the decision of L’Wren Scott, Mick Jagger’s American girlfriend, who committed suicide in New York…
Long life
More than 20 years ago, when I was living in New York, I wrote an article about the mutilation by…
Long life
Waitrose in Towcester has closed down for a week to make what it describes as ‘a final few touches’ to…
Long life
My house in south Northamptonshire looks out over parkland on which Henry VIII used to hunt deer with Anne Boleyn.…
Long life
In February each year the Oldie magazine gives ‘Oldie of the Year Awards’ to people who show unusual vigour and…
Long life
The new mayor of New York, who despite his name (Bill de Blasio) claims Irish ancestry, is boycotting this month’s…
Long life
With regard to modern technology, I find that people of around my age — by which I mean people in…
Long life
Shirley Temple, who died last week at the age of 85, was the most successful child film star in history.…
Long life
Who would ever have thought it, but I have become quite fond of Milton Keynes. Although I live slightly closer…
Long life
Here in the valley of the River Tove in south Northamptonshire my chickens are laying copiously, my ducks are quacking…
Long life
When one is in one’s seventies, as I am, one begins to fear the horror of dementia and to carry…
Long life
I have never supported the death penalty. Maybe I was influenced when I was six or seven years old by…
Long life
Of all the interesting revelations by the French magazine Closer about François Hollande, the most interesting for me is its…
Long life
In Dorchester during the Christmas holiday I bought a two-slice electric toaster at Currys. It was a nice little toaster…
Long life
The date of this issue of The Spectator is 4 January 2014, which also happens to be my 74th birthday.…
Long Life
This is the season of goodwill when one should think about people less fortunate than oneself and wish them better…
Long life
John Thompson, who died last week at the age of 93, could have been editor of The Spectator if he…
Long life
Back home from a week in Italy, I almost feel that I haven’t left. For I go almost at once…
Long life
It’s filthy wet weather in Tuscany, so I’m lying on my bed in the afternoon reading through the Italian newspapers.…
Long life
The police have been complaining a lot lately about frivolous calls to the emergency services. All over the country people…
Squires, spires and serenity
I don’t know whether Bruce Bailey, a proud Northamptonshire man, agrees with the late Sir Nikolaus Pevsner that no one…
Long life
I was in Nottingham last Sunday to address university students about journalism. The occasion was a one-day ‘media conference’ organised…
Long life
A month ago I was reporting complacently that peace and calm had returned to Stoke Park after a series of…
