Our God complex
Pantomime is meant to be silly and perhaps superficial, but fun. One does not (for example) join an audience for…
Letters
Teacher trouble Sir: Rod Liddle (‘The trouble with teachers’, 24 June) is quite correct in what he says about the…
No country for young men
One of the most reliable standards in international comedy has long been the outstanding ineloquence of American politicians. In this…
Business as usual
Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny is the fifth and final film in the franchise so it’s Harrison Ford’s…
A tale of two fortunes
Here’s a mystery for you. Why were Spoon, one of the most dynamic, sharpest rock bands in the world, playing…
Penalty points
James Graham’s entertaining new play looks at the England manager’s job. Everyone knows that coaching the national side is just…
A seasonal folly
As I sat down at this year’s Serpentine Pavilion, I overheard a curious exchange. ‘You mustn’t create art within art,’…
Time to start popping the pills
No one does agonising quite like Mobeen Azhar. In several BBC documentaries now, he’s set his face to pensive, gone…
The playful portraitist
In front of the banner advertising the RA Summer Exhibition, the swagger statue of Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723-92) by Alfred…
Mysterious ways
The Chester Mystery Plays date back to the 13th century – but are more popular now than ever, finds Richard Bratby
The turf
We all wanted Frankie to have a last Royal Ascot hurrah. In the end he got four, including a ninth…
High life
Rome To the Eternal City for the saddest of occasions, the funeral of the mother of Taki, 17, and Maria,…
Solid, drab grey
Count Maxim pursues his former cleaner Alessia to Albania – but sex in badly plumbed bathrooms while senseless on raki doesn’t sound that thrilling
Circular arguments
Aristotle had long proved that the Earth was spherical, and even the illiterate masses of early medieval Europe were aware of the fact, says James Hannam
A skilled networker
Born in 1559, Alice Spencer, a formidable networker, matchmaker and patron of the arts, was the muse of poets including Edmund Spenser and John Milton
Advice to struggling writers
Broad in scope and beautifully written, this unconventional autobiography contains some of the best advice struggling writers will ever receive
Across the wire at Belsen
Hannah Pick-Goslar, a survivor of the Holocaust and Anne’s friend in Amsterdam, movingly describes their snatched conversations in Belsen before Anne disappeared forever
