The Victorian melodrama that led to murder and mayhem
Early on the morning of 6 May 1840, a young housemaid in a respectable Mayfair street discovered that her master,…
The ancient Greeks would have loved Alexa
Among the myths of Ancient Greece the Cyclops has become forever famous, the Talos not so much. While both were…
A darkly comic road trip: The Remainder, by Alia Trabucco Zerán, reviewed
You could call The Remainder a literary kaleidoscope: look at it one way and you see how the past lays…
For the sake of art as much as society, it’s time to stop remembering the war
A cascade of poppies falls from ‘weeping windows’ across Britain. A 50-metre drawing of Wilfred Owen appears in the sand,…
One of the best plays I’ve ever seen: I and You at the Hampstead Theatre reviewed
Lauren Gunderson’s play I and You opens in the scruffy bedroom of 17-year-old Caroline. Lonely, beautiful and furious, she’s unable…
Like today’s conceptual artists, Burne-Jones was more interested in ideas than paint
‘I want big things to do and vast spaces,’ Edward Burne-Jones wrote to his wife Georgiana in the 1870s. ‘And…
Thanks to Making a Murderer, Wisconsin’s bovine incompetence has been exposed
I wonder if Wisconsin has any idea what an international embarrassment it has become? By rights it ought to be…
When the first world war ended, many soldiers were left with ‘a terrible empty feeling’
‘It was so unreal,’ said one of the first world war veterans about the long-awaited Armistice. It was the most…
Why David Byrne deserves every penny he makes from his tour
Let’s get the ‘was-it-good?’ stuff out of the way first. Yes, it was good. It was better than good. It…
Exquisite and riveting: Wildlife reviewed
Wildlife is an adaptation of the 1990 novel by Richard Ford about a family coming apart at the seams, and…
One of the last living avant-gardists speaks – Gyorgy Kurtag on his new Beckett opera
Arriving in Budapest, I receive a summons I cannot refuse. Gyorgy Kurtag wants to see me. Famously elusive, the last…
There’s nothing radical about Mike Leigh’s films
So there I was in Soho Square on a cold and rainy morning, nibbling my complimentary almond croissant and eagerly…
Trump has driven the American media mad
New York An old-fashioned party is a gathering of friends invited by the host or hostess, who foots the bill.…
The perils of smoking three-year-old Glaswegian skunk
Three years ago we were given a bag of skunk, Catriona and I, provenance Glasgow. It was one gigantic dried…
The NHS is teaching me how to stand properly
If you are wondering, any more than usual, how your tax is being spent, you should know that I have…
Why racing will miss Luca Cumani
Fairy tales can happen. On Sunday the filly God Given won Italy’s only Group One race of the season, the…
Bridge
This autumn has been the busiest (bridge-wise) I can remember. It started with the Crockfords final at the beginning of…
Nos morituri
Magnus Carlsen and Fabiano Caruana, those two gladiators of the mind, will duel in London during the remainder of this…
no. 531
White to play. This is from Carlsen-Caruana, Bilbao 2012. Black has blundered right out of the opening. How did Carlsen…
Neo-gothic
In Competition No. 3073 you were invited to submit a short story in the Gothic style with a topical twist.…
2384: Bang!
Unclued lights, singly or correctly paired, are of a kind, as given in Chambers. Ignore one apostrophe. Across 5 …
to 2381: Step changes
The word ladder connecting UNITED and STATES goes: UNITES (1D), URITES (18), WRITES (7D), WHITES (34), WHILES (30A), WHALES (7A),…
Roger Scruton becomes the latest victim of the Twitchfork mob
‘Once identified as right-wing you are beyond the pale of argument,’ wrote Sir Roger Scruton. ‘Your views are irrelevant, your…
Sending more people to uni isn’t the answer
Imagine a world where employers judged applicants solely on their dress. Anyone in frayed clothes or scuffed shoes would never…
