How my mother survived the Nazis, but took her own life
When the poet George Szirtes returned as an adult to Budapest, the city of his birth which he had left…
Tolkien in Africa: Black Leopard Red Wolf, by Marlon James, reviewed
Anyone who has issues with Tolkien (at 16, even in a suitably ‘altered state’, I could not finish The Hobbit,…
Here’s what I want from modern architecture, explains housing tsar Roger Scruton
The creation of a commission to examine beauty in new building created a stir in the media, with the chairman…
The first great English artist – the life and art of Nicholas Hilliard
When Henry VIII died in 1547, he left a religiously divided country to a young iconoclast who erased a large…
Few soldiers have seen as many terrible sights as Don McCullin
Diane Arbus saw mid-20th century New York as if she was in a waking dream. Or at least that is…
How good really was Berlioz?
Hector Berlioz was born on 11 December 1803 in rural Isère. ‘During the months which preceded my birth my mother…
If you’re tired of hygge then you’ll like Harald Sohlberg
If you’re tired of hygge then you’ll like Harald Sohlberg. The Norwegian painter eschewed the cosy fireside for the great…
Forget the Don – come for the Mataphwoar Ryoichi Hirano: Royal Ballet’s Don Quixote reviewed
The trouble with Don Quixote is Don Quixote. Whenever the doddering, delusional Don is onstage, tilting at windmills, riding his…
Enjoyably contrived: BBC1’s Baptiste reviewed
What’s the best way to start a six-part thriller? The answer, it seems, is to have a bloke of a…
The terrifying genius of Leonardo
A cataclysmic storm is unfolding. Dense, thunderous lines of black chalk sweep rapidly around the paper in frantic curls of…
‘Lock him in a motel & he’d do something astonishing’: Hockney on the genius of Van Gogh
Being in the south of France obviously gave Vincent an enormous joy, which visibly comes out in the paintings. That’s…
Crackles with nylon, self-regard and unearned privilege: On the Basis of Sex reviewed
Ruth Bader Ginsburg is too ill to sit on the Supreme Court. When she saw On the Basis of Sex,…
Why wasn’t Poetry Please in the Radio Times’s top 30 greatest radio shows of all time?
With the upsurge of listeners to Classic FM (now boasted to be 5.6 million listeners each week) and the imminent…
The worst Arthur Miller play I’ve ever seen
All About Eve is Cinderella steeped in acid rather than sugar. Eve, or Cinders, is a wannabe star who uses…
I’m all for abolishing flying: first-class on a liner is far more fun
Gstaad It’s party time here. From the richest billionaires down to those impoverished souls with only a few million…
The strange people who keep a nightly vigil over my mother
To begin with it was mice. The house was overrun with them. She saw them out of the corner of…
From Swarfega to cleanse and polish: my long path to perfect skin
‘Is it for your daughter?’ said the sales assistant as I pointed to an expensive skincare product. She had glided…
Bridge
Is it my imagination, or are we bridge players far more aggressive than we were a decade ago? I don’t…
Rock solid
This year’s Gibraltar Masters saw some surprising results at the top, chiefly the victory by the young Russian, Vladimir Artemiev,…
no. 542
White to play. This position is taken from Galinsky–Gunina, Gibraltar 2019. How can White finish off in this complicated position?…
Writer’s block
In Competition No. 3086 you were invited to submit a poem about the difficulty of writing a poem. In…
2396: Reader…,
Unclued lights are a set of literary 40s. Their creator is hidden in the grid and should be shaded. Elsewhere,…
to 2393: Monster Mash-up
HORROR FILM (1D) ACTOR (15) BORIS (10) KARLOFF (26), né PRATT (21A) died on 2 February 1969. Most famous for…
There’s space for a new party in Britain, but not for another SDP
I was 17 when the Labour party last split, in January 1981, and for a variety of reasons got quite…
