2458: Bardicarum
The unclued Across lights are of a kind, as are the associated Down ones. Across 1 Friendship revealed by American…
Letter from Tanzania
Dar es Salaam The World Health Organisation has drawn up a shortlist of countries it’s most concerned about during the…
Portrait of the Week
Home The United Kingdom seemed reluctant to come out of its lockdown. ‘We are likely to face a severe recession,…
Home-schooling, Plato style
Education is cumulative. The idea that it will be lost on a generation because, for one out of 42 terms…
Low life
The most visible local landmark is a solitary two-headed Jurassic mountain called Le Bessillon, six miles long and 800 metres…
Macbeth at the movies
The world’s greatest playwright ought to be dynamite at the movies. But it’s notoriously hard to turn a profit from…
Dear Mary
Q. My goddaughter was getting married in July but due to Covid-19 this has been postponed. I had already chosen…
Puzzle no. 605
White mates in two moves against any defence (composed by Walter Pulitzer). Steinitz admitted he could not crack this within…
Barometer
Unusual crowd FC Seoul apologised after using sex dolls to try to create some atmosphere as games went ahead behind…
Generous to a fault
Watching Heston Blumenthal arrange the infernal horror that is a lamprey’s head on a plate is one thing; seeing an…
Only the worst will survive
What does a critic do when her genre collapses? Mostly I panic. I speak to restaurateurs who believe that without…
Flights of fancy
Fieldwork can move the most rigorous scientist to lyricism, as Mark Cocker discovers
This is Royal Mail’s chance to appoint a boss fit for the new age
The Royal Mail worker who rang my bell to deliver an Amazon package on Friday was wearing a glittery ball…
Sage advice
From the outset of the Covid-19 crisis, the government was determined that scientists would play a central and highly visible…
A radical mismatch
Question: which American president and first lady would you care to imagine having intercourse? If that provokes a shudder, be…
Real life
When people ask me what I did during lockdown, I would like to give an inspiring answer, apart from growing…
Are you a lockdown eel or a pygmy goat?
I identify strongly with the garden eels in the Tokyo aquarium. Pre-corona, they were perfectly sociable. Come opening hour, when…
The escape artist
Arena: The Changin’ Times of Ike White (Monday) had an extraordinary story to tell — but one that, halfway through…
The Spectator’s Notes
Last month, writing elsewhere, I quoted the website of the China Centre at Jesus College, Cambridge: ‘Under the leadership of…
Surfer’s paradise
The full addictive potential of classical YouTube needs to be experienced to be understood. And let’s be honest, there are…
When actions speak louder than words
For all the abuse heaped on the Behavioural Insights Team early in the crisis, let’s not forget that the only…
