There is a diabolical conundrum facing conservatives at the forthcoming federal election: how to get more conservatives into Parliament? Once…

Why on earth are we stopping people who want to work from working? I used to work at a community…

Vale PJ

Where are our human rights ‘experts’ as Covid authoritarians strip away our freedoms?

Talking tax reform

‘God’s representative on Earth’ has nothing to say about China’s evil communist regime

China will be watching closely

Officials hide behind damned lies and Covid statistics

Australian health authorities have treated our kids shamefully

Why did our leaders sell us out to communist China?

Short of leg but big on personality, the eccentrically shaped dachshund is one of Britain’s most beloved pets. Originally known…

Living, as Clive James put it, under a life sentence, and having refused chemotherapy, I find I respond to the…

Macron’s global posturing may prove to be his downfall

Tom Hayes, Libor and a miscarriage of justice

Why men of a certain age love to get naked

How respiratory viruses evolve to become milder

Why work from home when you can work from paradise?

Has the Russian President gone mad?

To appreciate Putin’s intent, you only have to look at Russian history

Home Boris Johnson, the Prime Minister, announced, in the House of Commons, sanctions against Russia after its ‘renewed invasion’ of…

The Bull of Oman Sir: There was one significant omission in the cast of characters mentioned by Charles Moore in…

Yet another east European tragedy is unfolding before our eyes. We have watched this movie for more than 80 years.…

Virginia Giuffre may well be a heroine among all those abused in their youth. Ancient reactions compare interestingly with ours.…

Blow by blow Did Storm Eunice really set a new record for wind speed in England? A 122 mph gust…

Shortly after Covid emerged, our civil liberties were suspended. The government took control of when and for how long we…

Sooner or later, somewhere in the UK, we’ll have trains with women-only coaches. It’s an idea which keeps rolling around,…

Early in the corona era the historian David Starkey gave some thoughts on Covid. ‘We’ve got a Chinese virus,’ he…

The price of Brent Crude oil was hovering at $100 a barrel as Germany halted approval of the controversial Nord…

My most important new year’s resolution was cast aside this week. I had vowed that in 2022 I would eschew…

We are always cautioned against comparing a modern political event with those that led up to the second world war.…

No British soldiers will go to fight in Ukraine. The UK’s military involvement will be limited to weapons shipments and…

Howard Jacobson, who turns 80 this year, published his first novel aged 40. Since then he has produced roughly a…

Margaret Atwood is among the major writers of English fiction of our time. This is a very boring way to…

When in 1941 Winston Churchill famously declared that the newly formed Special Operations Executive, set up to encourage resistance movements,…

Julie Otsuka has good rhythm, sentences that move to a satisfying beat. Even as her tone shifts — from tender…

Suleiman I richly deserved his epithet, as this vivid account of his early years illustrates, says Jason Burke

Readers familiar with Sheila Heti’s work, most notably How Should a Person Be? and Motherhood, in which she examines both…

This is the gripping story of the ever-fluctuating fortunes of three generations of the Dudley dynasty, servants to — and…

The final scene in the brilliant television series The Sopranos is set in a diner where Tony’s family is gathered…

It’s not often that you get such a rapturous reception for a new show as Fun Home received and the…

In the latest episode of Louis Theroux’s Forbidden America, Louis asked a rapper called Broke Baby if ‘it’s important to…

We should learn to love our turn-of-the-millennium architecture, says Helen Barrett, starting with the Dome

One of the curiosities of modern pop’s landscape is that no one knows any longer how to measure success. An…

The Duke is an old-fashioned British comedy caper that is plainly lovely and a joy. Based on a true story,…

When you take in the richness of a Pina Bausch production — the redolent staging, the eloquent, eccentric twists of…

The Forest is the latest thriller from the French dramatist Florian Zeller, translated by Oscar winner Christopher Hampton. It’s a…

The tagline of This is Dating, a new podcast from across the pond, is ‘Come for the cringe, stay for…

Spoiler alert. The last words in Janacek’s The Cunning Little Vixen come from a child playing a frog. The story…

Two markers: ‘Cottages at Auvers-sur-Oise’ (c.1873) is a sweet especial rural scene of faintly slovenly thatched cottages with, at its…

A journalist friend has been writing an advice column rather like The Speccie’s ‘Dear Mary’. He was calling it ‘Ask…

A small award should be presented to the Australian’s Alice Workman for her new coinage. She has given us a…

Every Saturday morning Michael rises at four and drives down to the Côte d’Azur to the Magic World car boot…

Black to play. Maric-Gligoric, Belgrade 1962. White has offered to exchange the rooks on f5 and c3. But Gligoric found…

A strange crisis has befallen like. It had long been an object of obloquy and vilification in two functions. The…

My friend Nick Sandqvist says that coaching the England juniors is a joy; so great when someone enthusiastic and creative…

Forty-odd years ago a friend, a Liverpool supporter, somewhat unwisely took his girlfriend to Elland Road for a Leeds match…

Clues lead to 5-letter solutions. Each set of ten clues is presented in alphabetical order of the solutions. Correct positioning…

Langan’s, a brasserie off Piccadilly with curling orange neon signage calling its name, is under new management after it fell…

Q. Three weeks ago I banged my head on the lower branch of our near neighbours’ tree, which I couldn’t…

I’m writing this on my last day in Mexico City, having accompanied my 18-year-old daughter here for the first week…

The unclued lights form a quartet of three-word terms, each of which has the letter count of (6,6,6) which is…

In Competition No. 3237, you were invited to submit a short story using words of only one syllable. This challenge…

Hikaru Nakamura justified his wildcard invitation by taking first place at the Fide Grand Prix in Berlin this month. The…

‘A diary?’ said the lady in the chintzy gift shop, pronouncing the word very much as Edith Evans said ‘handbag’…

Was it Socrates who said that chaos was the natural state of mankind, and tyranny the usual remedy? Actually it…