The Week
How to fight Ukip
In the 2005 general election this magazine supported the Conservatives, with one exception — we urged voters in Medway not to…
Portrait of the week
Home The last British combat troops turned over Camp Bastion in Helmand to Afghan forces and withdrew from Afghanistan after…
Andrew Roberts’s diary: Just who’s the despot here – Napoleon or Paxman?
To the British embassy in Paris for a colloquium on ‘Napoleon and Wellington in War and Peace’ organised by our…
Rochester’s special qualities, and the price of Ebola.com
What’s special about Rochester What is special about Rochester and Strood? — Rochester has the second oldest cathedral and school…
Forget Ukip – what we need is some ostracisms
For all Nigel Farage’s appealing bluster, he is never going to be in a position to get us out of…
From the archives
From ‘A Probationer’s Diary’, by a Red Cross volunteer, from The Spectator, 31 October 1914: Friday. The wounded are coming to-morrow.…
Letters: In defence of Italy, and the rise and fall of the military moustache
Italy’s to-do list Sir: You would expect a long letter of rebuttal by a piqued senior diplomat in response to…
Deal with the debt, George Osborne? You’ve hardly started
George Osborne has declared victory over Ed Balls, the IMF and all the others who warned that his austerity measures…
Portrait of the week
Home A hundred firemen could not prevent wooden cooling towers at Didcot B gas-fuelled power station in Oxfordshire from burning…
Griff Rhys Jones’s diary: I am now less of a celebrity than my daughter’s dog
In order to promote the Dylan Thomas in Fitzrovia festival, I am trying to persuade Jason Morell, the director, that…
Why the Ancient Greeks thought adultery was worse than rape
A footballer serves his sentence for rape, insisting on his innocence. Debate rages whether he should play again. To us,…
From the archives
From ‘Topics of the day’, The Spectator, 24 October 1914: That spies are a great danger at the present time,…
Australian letters
Cultured Brisbane Sir: Re Culture Buff 11 October. One sore point. I could do without the patronising remark about Brisbane…
If Turkey turns on the West, what hope is there for Syria and Iraq?
Turkey has long been a bridge between the West and the Middle East. Its record on free speech may be…
Portrait of the week
Home Checks began at British airports for passengers who might have come from west Africa with Ebola fever (even though…
Prue Leith’s diary: I want to be green, but I’ve got some flights to take first...
‘Please God, make me good, but not yet.’ I know the feeling. As I get older and more deeply retired,…
David Cameron’s not the only one in trouble over morris dancing
Dirty dancing David Cameron was accused of causing racial offence by posing with blacked-up Morris dancers, though it was pointed…
Hannibal (and Alexander the Great) vs the Islamic State
Whatever the Islamic State hopes ultimately to achieve by its current onslaught on all and sundry in the Middle East,…
From the archives
From ‘War and wild life’, The Spectator, 17 October 1914: The siege of Antwerp has been a minor tragedy in…
Spectator letters: In defence of the GMC and Ukip members, and how Rachmaninov spelled Rachmaninov
Nothing to fear Sir: So long as we are not breaking any law, we have nothing to fear from the…
There is a way to beat Ebola (and we're already doing it)
There is something depressing about the fact that it has taken a sick Spanish nurse to put Ebola back on…
Portrait of the week
Home Alan Henning, 47, a British volunteer aid worker taken captive in Syria by Islamic State, was murdered, and footage…
Anthony Horowitz’s diary: Keeping James Bond’s secrets for the Smersh of publishing
It was quite fun being named as the new writer of 007 — although actually I’d make a lousy spy.…
Dealing with trolls the Swedish way
How to deal with a troll In Scandinavian mythology, trolls were shady creatures who lived below ground and varied in…
From the archives
From ‘News of the Week’, The Spectator, 10 October 1914: The Germans must really be in very desperate straits if,…
