Wishing for a merry Christmas
How well-behaved have you been in the second year of Covid? I wouldn’t say I’ve been perfect but I haven’t…
No man’s land
Despite the political misery for Boris Johnson as he ends the year, he has a big hope: that salaries will…
‘You’re brilliant, darling’
Joan Collins and Taki on golden Hollywood, fist-fights and getting cancelled
Barometer
Centenaries 2022 will see the 100th anniversary of: the BBC; Reader’s Digest; Ulysses by James Joyce; insulin treatment for diabetes;…
Dear Mary
From Lady Antonia Fraser Q. I enjoy getting readers’ letters, but there is one category I am at a loss…
The Cape of good reds
‘Earth has not anything to show more fair.’ One can admire the view from Westminster Bridge and feel near the…
Arthur’s death and the problem of evil
Since I first read about the torture and murder of six-year-old Arthur Labinjo-Hughes, I’ve had what feels like an A-level…
By Giorgio
Martin Gayford on a radical Nativity that is the subject of one of the great whodunnits of art history
What’s your favourite children’s novel?
J.K. Rowling Poignant, funny and genuinely scary, The Hundred and One Dalmatians was one of my favourite books as a…
Last post
It’s the thin end of the wedge, the slippery slope, the beginning of the end of a civilised Christmas. It…
Grand Dame
Jack and the Beanstalk is a big, sprawling family show that opens with a baffling gesture. A booming voiceover announces…
Low life
At the desk I gave my name and showed my Covid vaccination pass and the woman told me to take…
Chief Rabbi’s Notebook
Reactions to the recent passing of F.W. de Klerk transported me back to my childhood in South Africa. The horror…
Christmas trees
The closest thing we have to a native Christmas tree is the often broccoli-shaped Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris). But the…
Letters
Wrong cure Sir: In referring to the UK as the highest-spending European nation in healthcare proportionate to GDP (‘Hospital pass’,…
Nyet to Dr No
Last year I wrote a piece about James Bond for the ‘Freelance’ column of the Times Literary Supplement. All true…
Sherry trifle
Christmas brings out the best and the worst in me. It’s a chance to give in to my inclination to…
The turf
A joyful Saturday at Ascot recently reminded me that when the old Hurst Park Racecourse (near Hampton Court Palace) closed…
Stones notebook
I’ve lived in Chelsea for the past 35 years. Since 2002, I’ve photographed everything I find interesting here — churches,…
High life
A few weeks after Friedrich Nietzsche bragged to an admirer that he had completed a ruthless attack on our Lord,…
From Russia with love
The enduring appeal of The Nutcracker. The ballet wasn’t always considered quite such a box of delights
Just bring me a boiled egg
The Connaught Hotel’s formal dining room was always, to me, a place of childish myth; more comforting for being mythical.…
