Prophesying doom
Boualem Sansal’s prophetic novel very clearly derives its lineage from George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four. A totalitarian surveillance state, a fundamentalist…
Holy heroes
The Reformation is such a huge, sprawling historical subject that it makes sense, in this the 500th anniversary of Martin…
The road to independence
Alone with her father’s dead body, Olive Piper says, ‘I don’t know anything, except what I feel, and how can…
An epic for our times
Trailing rave US reviews, fan letters from Yann Martel and Khaled Hosseini and a reputation as ‘Doctor Zhivago for the…
Charming old fox
Talleyrand was 76 when he took up the post of French ambassador in London in 1830. Linda Kelly deals only…
The man and the moment
The centenary of the Russian Revolution has arrived right on time, just as the liberal democratic world is getting a…
Bear essentials
In Yoko Tawada’s surreal and beguiling novel we meet three bears: mother, daughter and grandson. But there will be no…
Changing lanes
It’s fair to say Sonja Hansen’s life has stalled. Forties, tall and ungainly, veteran of failed relationships, she’s an uncomfortable…
Beautiful thoughts for all occasions
Kahlil Gibran was 40 years old, a short — he was just 5’3” — dapper man with doleful eyes and…
The real BBC shocker: occasionally it isn’t biased
There’s one thing that bothers me a lot about the letter sent by ‘more than 70’ MPs to the director-general…
Pressing back
Washington, DC I hate to admit it, but I think I’m falling in love with Sean Spicer. No doubt…
Lest we forget
I never met Martin McGuinness, but I was certainly affected by him from an early age. His decisions, and those…
The camps don’t work
The civil war in Syria, and the resulting displacement of half the population, has been the tragedy of our times.…
The importance of being trolled
Ever since a Twitter troll was elected 45th President of the United States, the Twitterati has agonised over who to…
Cameron adrift
It can be cruel, the way politics plays out. At the very moment George Osborne was telling the bemused staff…
The Spectator’s notes
We keep being incited to find it heartwarming that Martin McGuinness and Ian Paisley were known as the Chuckle Brothers.…
Time to get tough on business-union sleaze
Nearly sixteen months after Dyson Heydon handed down his final report following the Royal Commission into Trade Union Corruption, Malcolm…
Property management, Greens-style
Now and again the world gets a real life opportunity to catch a glimpse what would happen if the inmates…
We have democratised censorship
The “Infidel” Ayaan Hirsi-Ali is coming to Australia on a speaking tour in April and she will be exercising her…
Clickbait feminism and the war on choice
TRIGGER WARNING: Mansplaining. Women can’t seem to catch a break these days. As if dealing with the catcallers, creeps and…
The abolition of women
I’m a bit turned-around on a rather major point of public discourse, dear reader, and am hoping you might walk…
Low life
My joints were aching suddenly and unaccountably — fingers, wrists, elbows, knees, toes — so I cried off the dinner…
A way for both sides to claim Brexit victory
Theresa May doesn’t do drama. She regards order as both a political and personal virtue. And this goes a long…
The Spectator’s notes
We keep being incited to find it heartwarming that Martin McGuinness and Ian Paisley were known as the Chuckle Brothers.…
The Spectator’s notes
We keep being incited to find it heartwarming that Martin McGuinness and Ian Paisley were known as the Chuckle Brothers.…
