Too bawdy for the Beeb
Malcolm Arnold composed his opera The Dancing Master in 1952 for BBC television. It never appeared, the problem being the…
Knee-jerk reactions
Before the television presenter Guto Harri took the knee live on air — which cost him his job at GB…
Grandeur and subtlety
The Victorian dictum ‘every picture tells a story’ is true of Paula Rego’s works, but it’s only part of the…
Sacred and dammed
It’s one of the most tantalising travel images in the world — a felucca floating along the Nile at sunset,…
Cricket notebook
Although it was a miracle that he survived until a few weeks before his 95th birthday, the death of John…
Bridge
Bridge is a game you can never fully master, which is why it’s so endlessly stimulating. No sooner have you…
Puzzle No. 663
White to play. A variation from Grandelius – Xiong, Fide World Cup, Sochi 2021. With an accurate queen check,White can…
2516: Such childish vocabulary
The nouns from the first sentence of a book (in the ODQ) appear as unclued lights — apart from two.…
The tax-and-spend Tories
When you ask a government minister why something hasn’t happened, you get a one-word answer: ‘Covid’. It has become the…
Solution to 2513: Golden anniversary
The announcement reads: ‘Fifty years ago, on July the third, Jac’s first crossword in this series was published.’ The shaded…
Get ready for the Boring Twenties
Earlier this year, I noted the suggestion (made by an American academic and run with by a swathe of the…
Kasparov’s tailspin
In a game between top players, the opening moves signify not only the battleground they have embraced, but also the…
Low life
We arranged to meet the second, more expensive, guide of our Somme battlefield visit at the Thiepval Memorial visitor centre…
The turf
At least England’s defeat in the European Cup final has spared us the sight of Boris Johnson, who can scent…
High life
Patmos I’m in Patmos with four grandchildren, two children, and a wife. I know, I know, it sounds very lower–middle-class…
Marriage guidance
In Competition No. 3208, you were invited to submit a recipe for marital bliss on behalf of an author of…
Real life
The scaffolding pole across the public footpath led to a farcical conversation with the local council. I had been walking…
No time for losers
Every red-blooded Englishman has believed that exercise in the open air is the finest prophylactic against popery, adultery and the…
A sly old fox
Rumours reach me that the libel report for Stephen Bayley’s forthcoming biography of Terence Conran was longer than the book…
A dangerous madness
The QAnon conspiracy theory may be absurd, but it can’t be ignored. It has already led to significant acts of violence, says Damian Thompson
No clowning around
What’s so serious about a red nose? How should we analyse the ‘specific socio-historical relations’ and ‘aesthetic trends particular to…
Bitter pills to swallow
What is it like to go mad? Not so much developing depression or having a panic attack — which is…
