How many babies in Britain are called Jihad?
Out of office French prime minister Sébastien Lecornu resigned after just 27 days – making his time in office 22…
What is the West without the Jews?
To the studio! Podcasts, if you ask me, are the one good thing to have come out of the digital…
Did Jonathan Powell torpedo the China espionage trial?
The antics of Keir Starmer and his top security adviser over the collapsed China espionage case bring to mind the…
The real war is to come for the Tories
British politics often resembles a golden-age murder mystery, with multiple parties sitting anxiously on the sofas/green benches waiting for the…
The Church of England’s muddle over sex and marriage
Whatever you think of the new Archbishop of Canterbury, Sarah Mullally, there can be no doubt about this: she firmly…
The frustrations of the Tory mindset
‘The facts of life are Conservative.’ This sentence is often attributed to Margaret Thatcher, whose centenary falls next week. The…
An album that proves Martinu was one of the great quartet composers
Grade: A Bohuslav Martinu was a patchy composer; worse, he was also a prolific one, meaning that if you dip…
The increasing fear felt by Britain’s Jews
If you walked down the Strand in London on Tuesday this week you would have been greeted by hundreds of…
Jilly Cooper was utterly unrivalled
Jilly Cooper, the last great Englishwoman of my lifetime – after Queen Elizabeth II and Debo – has died. The…
Palestinian nationalism has come to Cornwall
This is West Cornwall, land of fishing, jam first and Trotskyite crafters. There is a sizeable community of nutters yearning…
Letters: Why shouldn’t we eat swan?
Zero chance Sir: In Tim Shipman’s wide-ranging article on Kemi Badenoch (‘I have a lot of self-belief’, 4 October), she…
The folly of solar panels
The house fell silent as the last of the tourists took their oat milk and pretend cheese from the guest…
Has Taylor Swift been reading The Spectator?
The Last Dinner Party received quite the critical backlash when they arrived amid much fanfare in 2023. Posh, precocious and…
The mind-bendingly creative works of Louis Couperin
The French lutenist Charles Fleury, Sieur de Blancrocher, is one of those unfortunate historical figures who are chiefly remembered because…
How Germany is preparing for war
Hamburg What would happen if Russia was planning an attack on Estonia, Lithuania or Latvia – and the threat was…
What does it feel like to perform the same show 355 times in one year?
I have my routine down to a science. At 6.59, I’m sitting in the stairwell, typing on my laptop or…
Stephen Fry is the perfect Lady Bracknell
Hamlet at the National opens like a John Lewis Christmas advert. Elegant celebrations are in progress. The stage is full…
This museum is a lesson for all curators
The National Railway Museum is 50 years old, and it’s come over all literary. A quote from Howards End stands…
I could watch Balanchine’s Theme and Variations on repeat
R:Evolution is a pun, presumably intended to suggest that tradition is not static and the obvious truth that change always…
Gambling tax hikes could kill British racing
Back in the days when politicians were real flesh and blood rather than social media pushovers, I sat down with…
Save art history!
A few weeks ago I went along to a lecture on the Welsh artist, poet and soldier David Jones. Kenneth…
Down to the wire
The momentum augured badly for Fabiano Caruana in the final match of the Grand Chess Tour, held in Sao Paulo…
Spectator Competition: Virtue-signalling
For Competition 3420 you were invited to submit a poem or short story incorporating that sentence of Emerson’s: ‘The louder…
No. 871
White to play. Cmiel – Leitner, European Senior (50+) Championship, October 2025. The situation looks hopeless, but White found a…
