How do we greet one another today?
Conversation is a fascinating subject, says Philip Hensher – but very few people get it right
The genuine polymath is still one in a million
With unlimited information just a click away, everyone can pass as a polymath today, says Philip Hensher
Short stories to enjoy in lockdown
In these circumstances there’s a temptation to reach for the longest novel imaginable. If you’re not going to read Proust…
The cult of Sappho in interwar Paris
Philip Hensher describes how Paris became a magnet for literary-minded lesbians in the early 20th century – where they soon caused quite a stir
Gustav Mahler’s bid for greatness: the ‘Symphony of a Thousand’
Gustav Mahler was a passionate enthusiast for the colossal in music. Even so, his mighty eighth symphony stands apart, says Philip Hensher
Babies are aware of bilingualism from birth — if not before
Probably most of the world is bilingual, or more than bilingual. It is common in many countries to speak a…
Lydia Davis, like an inspirational teacher, tempts her readers into more reading
A good indicator of just how interesting and alluring Lydia Davis’s Essays proved might be my recent credit card statement.…
Vladimir Nabokov confesses to butterflies in the stomach
Not every novelist has opinions. Some of the greatest have a touch of the idiot savant, such as Adalbert Stifter,…
The concluding volume of Charles Moore’s life of Margaret Thatcher is – as its predecessors are – a triumph
This outstanding biography comes to an end, not in an atmosphere of triumph and achievement, but in a welter of…
Ian McEwan’s anti-Brexit satire is a damp squib
Kafka wrote a novella, The Metamorphosis, about a man who finds himself transformed into a beetle. Now Ian McEwan has…
No one held Susan Sontag in higher esteem than she did: Her Life reviewed
Towards the end of this tale of imperial intellectual expansion, Susan Sontag’s publicist goes to visit his shrink and, dealing…
America’s brutal borstals: The Nickel Boys, by Colson Whitehead, reviewed
Novelists will always be interested in enclosed communities — or the ‘total institution’, as sociologists say. When you separate a…
Polari, the secret gay argot, is making a surprising comeback
Imagine you’re a gay man living in the year 1950. Not unnaturally, you would like to meet another gay man.…
Toy theatres on the stage: the set designs of Maurice Sendak
I must have seen hundreds of opera productions in my time. Out of these, hardly any made a lasting impression…
Not all British memsahibs were racist snobs
Despite efforts to prevent them, British women formed a part of the Indian empire almost from the start. Although the…
Time for a Tippett revival
Running the entire course of the 20th century, Michael Tippett’s life (1905–1998) was devoted to innovation. He was an English…
A clear vision of Walter Gropius the man is hard to come by
Walter Gropius (1883–1969) had the career that the 20th century inflicted on its architects. A master of the previous generation…
How Calouste Gulbenkian became the richest man in the world
Whenever I find myself visiting some great historic house, I always like to break off from gawping at tapestries to…
Lonely hearts and guilty minds: the world of Pamela Hansford Johnson
The revival of interest in mid-20th century novelists is one of the most positive and valuable developments of our time.…
The personality test that conned the world
The other day in the Guardian’s Blind Date column, two participants, or victims, finished off an account of their frightful…
![Photograph of an almshouse waif by Lewis W. Hine, entitled ‘Little Orphan Annie in a Pittsburg Institution’ (1909) [Bridgeman Art Library]](https://spectatorau.imgix.net/content/uploads/2018/08/bookslead4aug.jpg?auto=compress,enhance,format&crop=faces,entropy,edges&fit=crop&w=410&h=275)
‘I am not a number’: the callous treatment of orphans
Orphans are everywhere in literature — Jane Eyre, Heathcliff, Oliver Twist, Daniel Deronda, and onwards to the present day. They…
The short step from good manners to lofty imperialism
In the gap between what we feel ourselves to be and what we imagine we might in different circumstances become,…
The wilder shores of excess in William Trevor’s fiction
A very prolific and long-standing writer of short stories reveals himself. William Trevor, who died in 2016, owned up to…
1968 and the summer of our discontent
’68 will do as shorthand. Most of ’68, as it were, didn’t happen in 1968. It was, at most, the…
Debussy: the musical genius who erupted out of nowhere
At the end of his study of Debussy, Stephen Walsh makes the startling, but probably accurate, claim that musical revolutionaries…
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