Features
Root out ragwort!
A sea of bright yellow flowers in a sun- drenched meadow… what could be more idyllic? Sadly, all that glisters…
Amateur porn is not empowering
If ever you find yourself bored and with 15 minutes to spare, I recommend looking up Pornhub’s annual report, the…
Make Rosé Pink Again!
When we first moved to the Languedoc, the less poncey part of the south of France nearly 20 years ago,…
British street names: short, simple and unpretentious
You know where you are with a British street name. I don’t mean literally. I mean there’s a tacit humility…
Making China great again
Most reporting on Jeremy Hunt’s visit to China this week went little further than his slip of the tongue in…
Macron’s summer of discontent
‘It could be argued that getting out of the office to beat up some leftists is a good way to…
The sensuous thrill of learning to swim in your sixties
Sharing a plate of oysters with a three-year-old: where could this be but France, where children are brought up not…
Who’s afraid of the WTO?
Warnings by Remainers about the consequences of a ‘no deal’ Brexit are beginning to resemble a game of oneupmanship worthy…
It’s not easy being a Corbynista Jew – just ask Jon Lansman
Being a Jew on the Corbyn left is soul- crushing. In the name of the cause, you must excuse racism…
Brexit means Boris
A few months before he died in 2007, Bill Deedes asked if I would come to see him at his…
![Pupils at Ampleforth in 1952 [Getty]](https://www.spectator.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/pupils.jpg?w=410&h=275&crop=1)
The sorry demise of Benedictine education
Twenty years ago, Douai, a monastic boarding school in West Berkshire, shocked parents with an announcement that it was ‘no…
The Hundred will kill cricket – in all forms
‘There can be no summer in this land without cricket’, wrote Neville Cardus, whose rhapsodic vision of the game lies…
The perfect way to spend two days in New York
In Britain I never drink cocktails, but on arrival in New York it has become a ritual that my first…
Ukip is back thanks to the Chequers backlash
The UK Independence Party might be about to make a comeback. Ever since Theresa May’s Chequers deal on Brexit, which…
Australia’s choice: Chinese trade – or American security?
Sydney For decades, Australia has been known as ‘the lucky country’. At the end of the world geographically, we are…
Children are everywhere – and they’re spoiling everything
There was a time when middle-class liberals used to complain that the English were a nation of child haters. They…
The view from Paris: ‘Why are Brexiteers so stupid?’
‘Problème est masculin; solution est féminine,’ says Brigitte, the adored French teacher at the British embassy in Paris. Good way…
Who cares about care homes?
For millions of middle-aged children, finding good care for their parents is akin to a Grail quest — and just…
Brexit: how to make a TV drama out of a crisis
I spent a bit of time last week on the set of the new Brexit film, which James Graham has…
Hastings is pretty – but it’s the people who make it special
Kevin Boorman loves Hastings, and his enthusiasm is infectious. He was born here, he’s lived here all his life and…
Assad is back for good in Syria – and with Trump’s blessing
Amid the confusion and the almost deafening cries of treachery and collusion over Donald Trump’s relations with Russia, few noticed…
Jean-Claude drunker
The atmosphere in Brussels has become, of late, reminiscent of the late Brezhnev era. We have a political system run…
Hitler’s would-be assassins were, themselves, Nazi war criminals. Why celebrate them?
On 20 July, Germany’s political elite recalls the day in 1944 when Colonel Claus Schenk Count von Stauffenberg exploded a…
The EU is sending migrants home – into the hands of people smugglers
What to do about illegal migration from Africa into Europe? The EU’s repatriation programme seems at first like a great…
Let funerals be sad
My wife died earlier this month. We knew it was coming. A lump in the breast begat bone tumours, begat…
