The Spectator
Australia
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These are exciting times to be a reader of, and subscriber to, The Spectator Australia, not to mention being its…
Australian Columnists
Australian notes
Bullocks As you drive into our nation’s beef capital you are greeted by a statue of a bull emblazoned with…
Australian Features
Lies, damn lies and coronavirus
Our authorities are undermining public confidence
Facebook and friends threaten our freedom
We urgently need to preserve our right to free speech
Women must lead the fight for equality in sports
Trans athletes have un-levelled the playing field for women and girls
Features
Letter from Texas
Austin ‘If I owned Texas and Hell,’ General Phil Sheridan famously said, ‘I would rent out Texas and live in…
Can the Union be saved?
The Holyrood elections are looming. But infighting dominates No. 10
Oysters
The latest fight between the EU and the UK isn’t over vaccines, but molluscs. Brussels won’t grant Britain a special…
The Week
No offence
At a time when resources are scarce, the Merseyside Constabulary must have thought long and hard about its recent advertising…
The enquiring minds of Egypt
The government has plans to fund a new research agency to back ‘cutting-edge science’. Ptolemaios (Ptolemy) I (367-282 bc), the…
Portrait of the Week
Home The much-anticipated decriminalisation of two consenting people meeting over coffee on a park bench was declared for 8 March…
Columnists
The Spectator’s Notes
There is a ‘pervasive presence of Chinese military-linked conglomerates and universities in the sponsorship of high-technology research centres in many…
Suddenly, it’s fast-forward to an electric future for the car industry
Back in November, when Downing Street’s pandemic responses looked daily more incompetent, the announcement of a ban on sales of…
Beware the linguistic Trojan horse
It’s the bane of many an author these days: those newspaper-filler Q&As. One I recently filled out included the question:…
31 inventions that really could transform the 21st century
‘Get Brexit done, then Arpa’ read Dominic Cummings’s WhatsApp profile. Arpa was what’s now the American Defense Advanced Research Projects…
It doesn’t matter what’s said – just who’s saying it
The Liberal Democrat party’s foreign affairs spokesgoblin, Velma from Scooby-Doo — or ‘Layla Moran’ as she is known to close…
Will normality return on 21 June?
‘Alas’ is a word used many times by Boris Johnson during the pandemic. It is how he prefaces announcements that…
Books
In the land of the blind
Somehow, American culture has got itself into a terrible mess of division and acrimony: elites against mainstream, progressives against conservatives,…
On the defensive
Lauren Oyler is viral and vicious. A critic with a reputation for pulling no punches, she is known for delivering…
Weeping wounds
In France, even the car horns yelled about Algeria. A five-beat klaxon blast — three short, two long — signalled…
Jolly good company
In the spring of 1945 three men pooled their resources in order to buy Long Crichel House, a former rectory…
The struggle to put bread on the table
Wheat flour, and the bread made from it, has been a recurring cause of concern for the British for centuries,…
The sister from hell
A while ago, Samantha Markle declared that her forthcoming book would be about ‘the beautiful nuances of our lives’. Was…
More magical thinking
Most collections of journalism are bad. There are two reasons for this: one is that they are usually incoherent and…
‘Just a poor boy – like me’
As the Great War unfolds, voices we don’t usually hear describe with a terrible raw honesty the realities of their experience, says David Crane
Arts
Anne-Marie Duff
Melbourne was just stirring into public cultural life when the hotel quarantine mishap led to that last alarming lockdown that…
Australian Love Stories: Celebrating love in all its guises at the NPG
The National Portrait Gallery seems to be floundering. That may be unfair but the announcement of the next exhibition left…
Colourisations and scale models
Another week, another online concert; and since orchestral music seems likely to be confined to screens and stereos for a…
The unlikely lads
The Almeida is fighting back against lockdown with a sprawling family drama about two long-lost siblings. Adrian Lester plays Gilbert…
Terrific little romps
Everything is too long these days, isn’t it? Every series is at least two episodes too long, podcasts go on…
‘I like upsetting people’
Michael Hann talks to the cult rock star Steven Wilson about why it’s harder to write a pop song than prog
Nothing personal
Pelé is a two-hour documentary about the great Brazilian footballer — the greatest footballer ever, some would say — who…
Divine revelation
Rosie Millard gets her gloved hands on one of the world’s most lavish – and expensive – art books
Thoughtful thriller
To begin on a cheerful note, it’s certainly been a good week for fans of slow-burn British crime dramas with…
Life
Kiwi Life
For New Zealanders to be losing our democracy may be due to sheer carelessness, ignorance, or even stupidity, not to…
Kiwi Language
Nancy Pelosi succeeded in banning ‘mother’ from appearing in the paperwork of Congress. Now the ANU’s Gender Institute Handbook wants…
2495: Contrary
Four unclued lights of a kind, one of two words with an apostrophe, include the theme word. The remaining unclued…
Wave power
In Competition No. 3187 you were asked to provide a sea shanty on a topical theme. This challenge was an…
Memories of Stellenbosch
Lockdown provides time to think, and to reminisce. A South African friend, trapped in Amsterdam, phoned the other day. Had…
Espouse
What do people think espouse means? It looks fairly plain, since spouses are to have and to hold, or indeed…
Opportunity knocks
There is a kind of conversation which sounds intelligent, and which makes sense at first hearing, but which deeper thought…
Synthetic diamonds
Diamonds are forever, they say. Likewise, brilliant games of chess have an everlasting sparkle. I will never tire of replaying…
The secret code of the ruling class
I naively hoped that last year’s statement by the Equalities Minister explaining why unconscious bias training was being phased out…
Solution to 2492: Little man
The solution at 1 Across includes the theme-word PAUL which means ‘little’, hence the puzzle’s title. First prize Mike Leese,…
Puzzle No. 642
Black to play. Warakomski-–Korobov, February 2021. White has a pin on the b-file and 1…Bxg2+ 2 Kxg2 Bc5 3 Rb7…











































































