Arts
Deathless dag
You need only pick up Tim Robertson’s Reliques/Pomes to know that you’re in the presence of a man with an…
Max factor
The German composer Max Reger, born 150 years ago next week, is mostly remembered today for countless elephantine fugues and…
Anything goes
Further than the Furthest Thing is an allegorical play set on a remote island populated by English-speakers from all over…
Feelgood fury
There are several reasons why Young Fathers currently feel like the most exciting live band in Britain, but for now…
Moomin minded
One of the lesser-known schools of modern philosophy is the Philosophy of Moomin. Like Cynicism or Epicureanism, it is difficult…
Turbo-charged Tiler
The death last week at the age of 83 of the sublime Lynn Seymour – muse to Ashton and MacMillan,…
Alan key
Allelujah, based on the stage play by Alan Bennett, is set in a geriatric ward in a Yorkshire hospital and…
A Rock and a hard place
Chris Rock was paid $20 million for his 70-minute Netflix special, so by my reckoning his riff on whether or…
The bowl and the bottle
Lucie Rie had no time for high-flown talk about the art of ceramics. ‘I like to make pots – but…
Morse mania
As the cult series draws to its conclusion, Tanya Gold travels to Morsefest in Oxford to meet the detective’s devoted followers
Shining in the mind
How many people have sat watching something stream (or whatever) on television and found themsleves incapable of turning it off…
Hot stuff
Hector Berlioz dismissed Handel as ‘that tub of pork and beer’ but it wasn’t always like that. Picture a younger,…
Same old story
Back in 1990, Grandpa from The Simpsons wrote a letter of protest to TV-makers. ‘I am disgusted with the way…
Sonic youth
Years ago, I asked Robert Plant what he felt about the world’s love of ‘Stairway to Heaven’. He said he…
Cumbersome muddle
Rupert Goold’s new show, Women, Beware the Devil, has great costumes, sumptuous sets and an intriguing chessboard stage like a…
I may destroy you
One day in October 1966 I came home from school and found a large man stripped to the waist, attacking…
I’ll never trust the Spanish again
Champions is an underdog sports movie starring Woody Harrelson as a baseball coach forced to take on a team with…
Monumental mistakes
Ukraine must stop demolishing its public statues, says Yevheniia Moliar
Sea fever
In March 1675 the Keeper of His Majesty’s Lodgings at Greenwich received an order for ‘Three pairs of shutters for…
An ecstatic torment of self-delight
What a week of music. On Thursday night we listened to the Chamber Philharmonia Cologne do Vivaldi’s Four Seasons at…
Dated and dreadful
Careful what you wish for. There can be no definitive way to stage an opera, and it’s the critic’s duty…
The art of the deal
Winner’s Curse is a hybrid drama by Dan Patterson and Daniel Taub which opens as a lecture by a fictional…
Barbarous and mundane
The debate sparked by Josh Baker’s BBC podcast on Shamima Begum, and her teenage flight to join Isis, has divided…
TikTok pop star
Even before albums became bloated, thanks to the largesse offered by CDs and streaming, most contained filler: those so-so songs…
The boys of summer
The Belgian film Close, written and directed by Lukas Dhont, which won the Grand Prix at Cannes and is up…
