The Spectator
15 September 2018 Aus
Toasting Brexit
Australia
Turnbull’s political suicide
The Canberra press gallery can’t work out why their favourite Liberal is no longer prime minister because they have almost…
Australian Columnists
Brown study
These days, a trip to Sydney is a great adventure for me and, as our all-wise government has abolished the…
Latham’s law
‘So where the bloody hell are you?’ Lara Bingle beseeched overseas travellers in Scott Morrison’s successful 2006 television ad. Morrison…
Australian Features
Stolen land? Tell that to the Berbers
Last month, Greens Senator Dr Mehreen Faruqi spoke some of the most misguided and divisive words heard in parliament in…
Upsetting Maggie
I had certainly not intended to upset Margaret Thatcher when I joined the Times in 1987 but when we met…
Sovereignty is sacred
Increasingly, many if not most Australian, British, American and other Western politicians have been imposing policies the people would never…
Toasting Brexit
When Yes, Prime Minister’s Sir Humphrey explained in 1986 to his PM that the determination of the British Foreign Office…
Wizards of Oz revisiting UK
Late in 1969 in Australian ports I was one of the many deck officers in the merchant navy in a…
The Spectator Anglo-Australia Forum
The Aussie sun shone down over a glistening Sydney harbour only metres from where the First Fleet landed back in…
Features
The Tory battle has only just begun
It looks as if the Conservative party is already at war. Fifty or so Brexiteer Tory MPs openly meet to…
Save us from Tiger, the posh Poundland of tat
There is a Tiger on the loose. It is stalking our high streets. It is prowling our train stations. It…
Elizabeth, the Eurosceptic queen
There has been much inconclusive speculation on the Queen’s views on Brexit. In 2016, the Sun asserted that she was…
Tom Tugendhat: the next Tory leader should be from my generation
When Boris Johnson compared Theresa May’s Brexit plan to wrapping a suicide vest around Britain’s constitution, the harshest response came…
The backlash to Trump has begun – and Republicans should not be surprised
Washington, DC Republicans observing a rising wave of liberal and progressive candidates, policies and election results in the United States…
In Idlib, the final chapter in Syria’s civil war has begun
Beirut The customs man wore a white linen suit. He had a large moustache. His ample belly touched the edge…
There’s a reason Unst is called the island above all others
‘I’d like a copy of the Times,’ said the visitor from the south. ‘Yesterday’s or today’s?’ the shopkeeper asked. ‘Today’s,…
The Week
Why can’t the warring Tories see that a Brexit deal is within grasp?
Loyalty, it used to be said, was the Tories’ secret weapon. No longer. Self-discipline has been discarded — along with…
Portrait of the week: Tories against Brexit, the Salisbury poisoning and Sweden’s election
Home Michel Barnier, the EU’s chief Brexit negotiator, was said to want to throw a lifeline to Theresa May, the…
Rachel Johnson: Getting sacked is a badge of honour. And I should know
People are still asking ‘So, how was your summer’ and mine was nice as far as it went: I didn’t…
Boris Johnson and the art of rhetoric
Boris the rhetorician is in full voice at the moment, delighting his followers and infuriating his enemies. But is this…
Who was the first suicide bomber?
The first suicide bomber Boris Johnson was criticised for likening Theresa May’s Chequers deal to a ‘suicide vest’ around the…
Australian Letters
Perhaps Sir: The editorial marking the 10th anniversary of the Australian edition (September 8) salutes the leading contributors. Less than…
Columnists
Is it possible to draw Serena Williams without being racist?
I have spent the morning trying to draw a cartoon of a black person without it being racist. It’s bloody…
Must ‘the will of the people’ always be respected?
I’ve always respected Alistair Darling and cannot imagine him saying anything ill-considered. But listening to him interviewed last Monday on…
It’s not transphobic to question transgenderism
This column is not in my interest. But then, not for the first time. I cannot count the conversations conducted…
Ten years after Lehman’s fall, how close is the next crash?
Our cinema is showing Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again and I’m reminded of a remark attributed to Mark Twain,…
Books
Handel’s greatest hits — the glorious London decades
England has been home to three great composer-entrepreneurs since 1700: Benjamin Britten in the 20th century; Arthur Sullivan in the…
Dear Mr President: the ‘little people’ write to Obama
President George Washington received about five letters a day and answered them all himself. By the end of the 19th…
Playing for time
In a pleasing nod to Marcel Proust, Eustace, the middle-aged protagonist of Patrick Gale’s new novel, is propelled into memories…
‘Ted is liar. Ted beats me up. Ted wishes me dead’: Sylvia Plath descends into madness and misery
In 1923, a Frenchman, Emile Coué, persuaded millions of Americans to finger a piece of string with exactly 20 knots.…
Peter Carrington: loyal, funny and driven by a sense of duty
‘I’m sorry to bother you, Peter, but you were a famously successful Leader of Their Lordships and I wondered whether…
Bombs and begonias: gardening in a war zone
During the civil war in Afghanistan in the late 1980s, Mr and Mrs Roami, a science professor and a nurse,…
The ‘other’ life of Harvey Milk
This is the story of the ‘other’ Harvey Milk. We all know about Harvey the San Francisco politician who was…
Jan Morris talks to herself — about music, irony and cats
To Jan Morris, I am anathema. That goes, too, for David Attenborough. It is a word that this unarguably great…
Philip Marlowe’s last case? Only to Sleep, by Lawrence Osborne, reviewed
Only to Sleep is the third Philip Marlowe novel written by someone other than Raymond Chandler and while the authors…
A friendship in flux: Normal People, by Sally Rooney, reviewed
‘Marianne had the sense that her real life was happening somewhere very far away, happening without her, and she didn’t…
‘You don’t want to end up like us’: How I got out of Soho just in time
On the one hand, I am supremely qualified to review this book. In 1984, bored beyond endurance after graduating with…
‘The reality was disgusting’: Peter Ackroyd slams Victorian Britain
‘It was the best of times, it was the worst of times… it was the epoch of belief, it was…
Deep in the forest’s mysteries: The Cloven, by Brian Catling, reviewed
Brian Catling’s great trilogy takes its title from The Vorrh, his first volume. This final book fulfills all the promises…
Alan Johnson: the rock and roll years
We’ve had Alan Johnson the lad from the slums of north Kensington, Alan Johnson the postman and Alan Johnson Member…
The burden of freedom: Washington Black, by Esi Edugyan, reviewed
It’s 1830, and among the sugar cane of Faith Plantation in Barbados, suicide seems like the only way out. Decapitations…
![View of Marseille from the basilica of Notre-Dame de la Garde, also known as La Bonne Mère, traditionally regarded as the city’s protectress. ‘The Good Mother intervenes at sick beds, down shadowy streets, and in the dark hours of night,’ writes Iain Sinclair [image: Getty]](https://www.spectator.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Marseille.jpg?w=730&h=486&crop=1)
How do our surroundings affect our health and happiness?
The Wellcome Trust puts on some of the most engaging exhibitions in London and holds in its permanent collection a…
Arts
Tintoretto unmasked
Tintoretto was il Furioso. He was a lightning flash or a thunderbolt, a storm in La Serenissima of Renaissance Italy,…
High culture or state-of-the-art murder simulators?: Videogames: Design/Play/Disrupt reviewed
For the past few decades, admirers of video-games have every couple of years mounted a new attempt to persuade the…
J.S. Bach v. Joan Baez
I was at a funeral the other day at which the music was so inspiring that I struggled to feel…
Its producers should tape a cyanide pill to the programme: The Humans reviewed
Hampstead’s boss Ed Hall was so impressed by Stephen Karam’s play The Humans that he wanted to direct it himself.…
Gloriously macho: Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan reviewed
This week’s guilty pleasure is Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan (Amazon Prime). It’s trash, of course, but very well done, high-octane,…
Often baffling but ultimately entertaining: Britten’s Paul Bunyan reviewed
‘I feel I have learned lots about what not to write for the theatre…’ There’s a prevailing idea that the…
Just an average romcom – or am I being too old-trouty?: Crazy Rich Asians reviewed
The cast and producer of Crazy Rich Asians were present at the screening I attended and said a few words…
Evita and Che
‘The people adore me/ So, Christian Dior me’ is just one of the many witty and pointed couplets written by…
Life
My faux pas at the Duke of Beaufort’s bash
A letter from a reader in South Africa mentions that the writer’s father insisted a white dinner jacket was permissible…
Back from the brink
The long table was set out under four beautifully pollarded plane trees festooned with coloured lanterns and red balloons. Twenty…
I was hounded by a canine sex pest
A big part of my problem is that I don’t understand why people do the things they do. I was…
Always trying: Britain’s most successful – and argumentative – trainer
An American trainer was once asked to name the greatest quality of the legendary jockey Willie Shoemaker. He replied: ‘The…
Caruana chronicles
In the run-up to the Carlsen-Caruana World Championship match set for London in November, I will be previewing their prospects.…
no. 523
Black to play. This position is from Potkin-Caruana, Dagomys 2010. How did Caruana finish off with a flourish? Answers to…
All’s well that ends well
In Competition No. 3065 you were invited to supply a happy ending for a well-known play, poem or novel. …
2376: Somewhere XI
On 15 September somewhere bordered by 31 and 5, and whose capital is 40/10 (ignore an accent), celebrates its 43…
to 2373: Susurrus
The theme was The Wind in the Willows (suggested by the title). RATTY defined 9, 13 and 22; MOLE defined 7,…
Dr Toby’s booze advice: the better the wine, the less bad it is for you
I don’t hold out much hope for Drink Free Days, a new campaign launched by Public Health England and the…
Silicon Valley’s weird ideas on how to improve human life
Which is more diverse: London or Devon? That’s not a trick question. London is much more diverse than Devon. But…
Dear Mary: I had £300 stolen while at a friend’s house. Should I tell them?
Q. Following a small dinner last night in a private house, I got home to find £300 missing from my…
My host’s reciprocity was almost embarrassingly generous
Peace came dropping slow. I have never regarded west Flanders as part of la France profonde, but here we were,…
The origin and nature of teacakes
The Sunday Telegraph has been running a correspondence on the origin and nature of teacakes. One reader averred that in…
