Two big books on motherhood and childlessness: Catherine Mayer got emotional
A single survey, elevated by news organisations to scientific certainty, suggests that air travellers may be more susceptible to tears…
One of the world’s great love stories
‘I still think he was a bastard.’ This is the opinion that Julia, daughter of the novelist Arthur, has about…
America’s empire – a story of the secret and the convenient
Where other nations disbanded their empires following the second world war, America’s underwent transubstantiation, from something solid to something more…
Making the case for multilingualism – a timely reminder
English as the world’s lingua franca isn’t going anywhere. Why, then, should we Anglophones bother to learn another language? What’s…
Sadie Jones’s modern morality tale
The love of money, says St Paul, is the root of all evil. The Snakes makes much the same point.…
In (vain) search of the snow leopard
Alex Dehgan is clearly someone with a penchant for hazardous jobs. Even in the first few pages we find him…
Lotharingia: Charlemagne’s much disputed legacy
In 1919, only months after the end of the Great War, a French airman called Jacques Trolley de Prevaux, accompanied…
A delicious novel from one of our most inventive contemporary voices
‘Food experiences,’ writes Michael Flanagan in his paper ‘Cowpie, Gruel and Midnight Feasts: Food in Popular Children’s Literature’, ‘form part…
Faber’s new ‘poetry’ collection
If you’re unsure whether Shaun Ryder’s lyrics for Happy Mondays and Black Grape really deserve the full Faber-poetry treatment, then…
Enjoy a blast of Spanish sun from Joaquin Sorolla
Artists can be trained, but they are formed by their earliest impressions: a child of five may not be able…
Magnificently incoherent: Royal Trux’s White Stuff reviewed
Grade:A Royal Trux are back — kind of. Singer (if that’s what you want to call what she does) Jennifer…
Cringingly vulgar, brainless and lacking heart: ENO’s Merry Widow reviewed
Garrick Ohlsson is one of the finest pianists of his generation. Why, then, was the Wigmore Hall not much more…
An undervalued songwriter and decent man: Bryan Adams at Wembley reviewed
On 29 June 1991, a record called ‘(Everything I Do) I Do It For You’ by Bryan Adams entered the…
A great example of how Radio 4 is using new technologies to enhance audio
‘It’s too familiar, too obvious,’ says Cathy FitzGerald at the beginning of her new interactive series for Radio 4, Moving…
For many artists being propagandists has become their raison d’être
If you want to lose friends and alienate people in the art world, try telling them you support Britain leaving…
Deserves its classic status: Jesus Hopped the ‘A’ Train at the Young Vic reviewed
Jesus Hopped the ‘A’ Train by Stephen Adly Guirgis deserves its classic status. This wordy and highly cerebral play pulls…
Promising but, compared to the first series, short of laughs: Fleabag reviewed
BBC2’s MotherFatherSon announced its status as a classy thriller in the traditional way: by ensuring that for quite a long…
Finally a Marvel film that doesn’t entirely bore the pants off Deborah Ross
Captain Marvel is the 654th film in the Marvel franchise — the figure is something like that, I think —…
Watching my grandchildren schussing down a mountain is what makes me happy now
Gstaad As everyone knows, the definition of serendipity is searching for a needle in a haystack, and instead finding…
I hadn’t had a drink in six weeks but that was seven hours, three pubs and a club ago…
Standing in a messy kitchen at the tendril tip of a county line at three o’clock in the morning, Trev…
My life is like that new Netflix series Russian Doll – a series of recurring crises
Russian Doll is a brilliant new Netflix drama in which a woman relives the same night over and over again.…
For now, here in Laikipia we have the only population of black panthers in the world
Laikipia A female black panther was recently photographed at our neighbours’ place. Exactly like Kipling’s Bagheera, she was ‘inky…
Susanna Gross
Geir Helgemo is the most revered bridge player in the world — and that isn’t about to change just because…
Bunratty
The Bunratty tournament in Ireland is one of the highlights of the chess year and always attracts an impressive field.…
no. 544
White to play. This position is from Hebden-Williams, Bunratty 2019. How did White finish in fine style? Answers to me…
