Parting on good terms
Many EU officials would like to present the Brexit negotiations as a case of one nervous member, weak at the…
Letters
On Pamela Harriman Sir: When it comes to grandes horizontales and naughty girls, I defer to Taki (High Life, 8…
Portrait of the Week
Home Boris Johnson, the Foreign Secretary, having cancelled a trip to Moscow over the Syrian poison gas incident, consulted other…
A whistleblower mystery that illuminates the inner turmoil of the banking sector
What troubled places banks have become, I thought as I listened to two news stories, one concerning a formal reprimand…
Who dares face down the teenage gangsters?
The baby, unbothered by diesel fumes, enjoys an outing down the main road through London N1. Each passing bus is…
Give me the Anglican option
The Algerian government’s official tourist guide describes ‘the walled town of Beni Isguen — normally closed to foreigners — where…
If Trump’s listening to his generals, that’s great news for Britain
‘Great Britain has lost an Empire and not yet found a role’. Fifty-five years on, Dean Acheson’s remark has not…
The Spectator’s notes
Each Easter, I think of David Jones (1895-1974). He was a distinguished painter and, I would (though unqualified) say, a…
Bridge
Bridge 24 was set up seven years ago by four Polish internationals who wanted to bring the glory days of…
Presidential panic
This month, watch out for unidentified fleeing presidents. Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, president of Fidé, the World Chess Federation, and a self-confessed…
no. 452
White to play. This position is from Euwe-Fischer, New York 1957. White has two winning moves in this position. Can…
First Bourne
‘Modern’ dance was no laughing matter in 1987. Harold King, director of the now-defunct London City Ballet, cattily typified it…
Concrete cuckoo
The Catholic Church’s Second Vatican Council provides a salutary example of a tiny ‘elite’ foisting ‘anti-elitist’ practices on the ‘non-elite’…
Seeking closure
The Sense of an Ending is an adaptation of Julian Barnes’s 2011 Man Booker prize-winning novel starring Jim Broadbent (we…
The good, the indifferent and the simply awful
‘There is only one thing worse than homosexual art,’ the painter Patrick Procktor was once heard to declare at a…
Tales of the unexpected
It’s the oddest place to find a profound meditation on the death of Christ, but there it is on Radio…
Look back in anger
‘What we really need is a faux-historical drama series about police brutality and black activism set in 1970s London,’ said…
The decade the music died
For much of the past half-century, London has been the world’s orchestral capital. Not always in quality, but numerically without…
Law in action
It’s like Raging Bull. The great Scorsese movie asks if a professional boxer can exclude violence from his family life.…
Terrorism diary
Tommy Robinson, Caolan Robertson and I were filming in a Chelsea studio for Rebel Media. We were recording videos about…
Dear John
In Competition No. 2992 you were invited to submit a Dear John letter, in prose or verse, in the style…
Dear Mary
Q. My aunt lives in a small market town with narrow roads and limited parking. A neighbour opposite acquired a…
Christ almighty?
Last week, Egypt declared a state of emergency. Twin bombings of churches that were packed for Palm Sunday services killed…
North Shore, running sore
On the eve of the North Shore by-election Liberal Party candidate Felicity Wilson was confronted over a string of fibs…
Some things get censored at Sydney Uni…
In 1964, a small student protest movement gained traction across the United States and galvanised the entire nation. At the…
