Hero or double agent? An encounter with Lech Walesa
Lech Walesa is probably the most famous of all the thousands — actually millions — who struggled against the oppression…
‘Utterly betrayed’: Britain’s Jews are now politically homeless
We Jews have evolved to be neurotic; so neurotic that, in certain circumstances, the Syrian border feels slightly safer than…
Franco’s exhumation could help decide the Spanish election
I was no sooner in Madrid than General Franco was exhumed from his mausoleum not far from El Escorial. An…
George Eliot was much more radical than we give her credit for
It’s easy to forget, as we celebrate the 200th anniversary of her birth, how radical George Eliot actually was. The…
The war heroes of Northolt Airport
At 6.50 p.m. on 31 August 1997 a plane touched down at Northolt Airport. It was a lamentable and dismal…
Books of the year – part one
Philip Hensher The best novels of the year were Colson Whitehead’s The Nickel Boys (Fleet, £16.99) and James Meek’s To…
Vladimir Nabokov confesses to butterflies in the stomach
Not every novelist has opinions. Some of the greatest have a touch of the idiot savant, such as Adalbert Stifter,…
It’s a dull world in which children don’t challenge their parents
On the Shoulders of Giants consists of 12 essays that the late Umberto Eco gave as lectures at the annual…
Picturing paradise: the healing power of art
Some 35 years ago I visited the National Gallery of Sicily in Palermo on the hunt for the ‘Virgin Annunciate’…
Rescuing the great British Cheddar
Gastronomy is one of the deepest forms of culture. If you’ve grown up in France you know this, to the…
How to message a Martian
Apparently the first audio message broadcast into space with the ostensible purpose of communicating with aliens was the sound of…
A tribute to the grandes dames of gardening — Beth Chatto and Penelope Hobhouse
There is no longer much point buying strictly practical gardening books, such as were a staple of the publishing industry…
There’s no end to the wonders of the human body, says Bill Bryson
Bill Bryson has come a long way from being the funniest, most irreverent travel writer around. He’s still as amiable,…
Dieting to death: a black comedy of boarding school life
It sounds in bad taste, but Scarlett Thomas has written a riotously enjoyable novel about a boarding school full of…
When atheists stole the moral high ground
In 1585, Jacques du Perron presented to the court of the French king Henry III, as a kind of after-dinner…
Liberty depends on a delicate balance between state and society
Liberty is a fragile thing. For thousands of years, civilisations have risen, flourished and fallen, and most of them have…
Mick Hucknall on women, rejection and cultural appropriation
What makes someone become a pop star? Sometimes, it’s true, pop stardom arrives by accident, and its recipient responds not…
John Flaxman is the missing link between superhero movies and Homer
As you enter the forecourt of the Royal Academy, you see them. A row of artistic titans, carved in stone,…
How a City lawyer conquered the hardest piano work ever written
Charles-Valentin Alkan played the piano faster than Liszt and louder than Chopin. The dying Pole left instructions that only Alkan…
God awful: BBC1’s His Dark materials reviewed
‘Here’s your new Sunday night obsession…’ the BBC announcer purred, overintoned and mini-orgasmed, like she was doing an audition for…
Why I love a bit of death on a Sunday night
There’s nothing like a nice bit of death on a Sunday evening. Radio 4 originally transmit their obituary programme Last…
Scorsese at his most leisurely, meandering and engrossing: The Irishman reviewed
The Irishman is Martin Scorsese’s three-and-a-half-hour epic — a mobster-a-thon, you could say — starring Robert De Niro, Al Pacino,…
The open-hearted loveliness of Hot Chip
Squeeze and Hot Chip are both great British pop groups. But they never defined a scene. Their ambitions extended further…
Why the Royal Court is theatre’s answer to Islamic State
The Royal Court is the theatre’s answer to Islamic State, a conspiracy of nihilists fascinated with death, supported by groups…
Woke slogans welded to incompetent grunge: Neil Young’s Colorado reviewed
Grade: B- Horribly woke boilerplate slogans welded inexpertly to the usual incompetent Crazy Horse grunge. Young and his pick-up band…
