Arts
Is BBC1’s Quirke bravely unhurried – or too slow?
The work of John Banville — Booker-winning novelist and impeccably high-minded literary critic — might seem an unlikely source for…
Uncovering a Royal treasure trove
It’s rare for the public to be given access to the Royal Archives. They are housed in the forbidding Round…
Royal mail
It’s rare for the public to be given access to the Royal Archives. They are housed in the forbidding Round…
Royal mail
It’s rare for the public to be given access to the Royal Archives. They are housed in the forbidding Round…
Thinking games
Forget the pedantic classifications of genres, styles and schools. When it comes to dance performances, it all boils down to…
Worshipping Bach
When I was first learning about classical music, 50 years ago, the scene was more streamlined than it is now.…
Worshipping Bach
When I was first learning about classical music, 50 years ago, the scene was more streamlined than it is now.…
Bill Forsyth interview: ‘If we hadn’t made a go of it, my plan was just to disappear.’
Award-winner Bill Forsyth tells William Cook why he was happy to walk away from film-making
Joan Littlewood has a lot to answer for – but Fings Ain't With They Used T'Be' makes up for it
Joan Littlewood’s greatest disservice to the theatre was to champion ‘the right to fail’, which encouraged writers and directors to…
WNO's production of Schoenberg's Moses und Aron is an overwhelming experience – but make sure you close your eyes
On paper, Moses und Aron might seem intractable and abstract: a 12-tone score setting a libretto that meditates on God,…
I suspected Maleficent would be terrible from the very first shot
If a gang of knife-wielding toddlers ever presses you for the name of the best Disney film, Sleeping Beauty (1959)…
The rights and wrongs of box-set viewing
Admit it. Say it! ‘My name is Blah and I am a boxaholic.’ Life on hold, marriage in bits, job…
Can Lynn Chadwick finally escape the 1950?
Lynn Chadwick was born 100 years ago in London, and died in 2003 at his Gloucestershire home, Lypiatt Park, where…
Harry and Paul’s Story of the Twos is just too funny for its own good
On Harry and Paul’s Story of the Twos (BBC 2, Sunday), there was a particularly cruel sketch in which Paul…
What's happened to children's radio?
Much praise has been lavished on Radio 2’s 500 Words short-story competition, the winners to be announced on Friday’s Chris…
When Van Gogh lived in London
Eighty-seven Hackford Road, SW9, is unremarkable but for a blue plaque telling the world that Vincent van Gogh once lived…
Past lives
Eighty-seven Hackford Road, SW9, is unremarkable but for a blue plaque telling the world that Vincent van Gogh once lived…
Past lives
Eighty-seven Hackford Road, SW9, is unremarkable but for a blue plaque telling the world that Vincent van Gogh once lived…
Polly Teale interview: Cuts are making the theatre ‘a place where you can only survive if you are from a privileged background’
Lloyd Evans talks to the good-natured theatre director Polly Teale
I could be dead soon. What should I listen to?
If I live as long as my father, I’ll be checking out on 9 December 2017. Since every man in…
Josef Albers: roaring diagonals and paradisiacal squares
Josef Albers (1888–1976) is best known for his long engagement with the square, which he painted in exquisite variation more…
We’re very lucky Philip II was so indulgent with Titian
In Venice, around 1552, Titian began work on a series of six paintings for King Philip II of Spain, each…
Romeo, Juliet and Mussolini
George Balanchine’s Serenade, the manifesto of 20th-century neoclassical choreography, requires a deep understanding of both its complex stylistic nuances and…
A Rosenkavalier without a heart ain’t much of a Rosenkavalier
In all its minute details, Der Rosenkavalier is rooted in a painstakingly stylised version of Rococo Vienna that, paradoxically, is…
Memo to Nick Payne: filling your plays with cosmic chit-chat doesn’t make you intelligent
How do you write a play? Here’s one theory. Put a guy up a tree, throw rocks at him, get…
