Horoscopes and horror – the reign of Septimius Severus
Notoriously brutal and superstitious, Rome’s first African emperor was responsible for killing of his rivals on an unprecedented scale as well as genocide against the Scots
The wild world of the ‘Ozempic safari’
Safari log: 3.56 p.m. and the Land Rover is parked up on the savannah. Inside, we wear dark glasses and…
On the trail of a missing masterpiece: What We Can Know, by Ian McEwan, reviewed
In the archipelago-republic of 22nd-century Britain, a literary scholar becomes obsessed with a long-vanished sonnet sequence and the woman who inspired it
Spectator Competition: Throuple
Comp. 3416 invited you to marry romantasy (the romance-fantasy fusion now dominating fiction sales) with a third genre. Narnia, gritty…
Ignorance, madness or folly – what exactly constitutes stupidity?
In a picturesque ramble through world civilisation, Stuart Jeffries proposes some answers
Autism isn’t a ‘superpower’
A very warm welcome for Margaret Thatcher inside autism’s ever-growing tent – if she can find space to wield her…
Alchemy – the ultimate fool’s errand
Secretive, expensive and doomed to failure, the business of turning base metal to gold nevertheless occupied scholars for centuries
Mandelson’s Epstein problem is not going away
When King Charles hosts Donald Trump for the state banquet at Windsor Castle next week, the dignitaries should know better…
