Creation story
In Competition No. 2968 you were-invited to take the title of a short story by Ted Hughes, How the Whale…
Theresa’s Tory love-in
Theresa May doesn’t use an autocue for her speeches. She feels that reading off a screen at the back of…
Critique
‘Americans,’ said my husband in much the same tone that Betsey Trotwood said ‘Donkeys’. It was his way of explaining…
The Spectator’s Notes
Birmingham Checking in to my hotel room on the 18th floor, for the Conservative party conference here, I opened the…
Legal notes
On the haters and their hatred of ‘hate speech’ In the law of libel a statement of claim still alleges,…
The new reality on immigration
The good people of Hungary went to the polls on Sunday and voted by more than 98 per cent against…
Hole in the heart
Richard Jones’s new production of Don Giovanni at ENO bears some passing resemblances to the opera as envisaged by its…
The parenting trap
Out of the fog of rumour and accusation surrounding the melancholy break-up of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, one source…
Question time
At my wife’s first 12-week scan, I was expecting — and duly got — that much-documented sense of thrilled wonder…
I want my Brexit good and strong
What you really should have done if you were in Birmingham on Monday this week was skip the not notably…
Real life
After a year dealing with estate agents I can only say: a plague on all their houses, except the one…
Brexit spooks the markets, but the housing crisis will swing more votes
‘I rang and said can I have a council house, I’ve nowhere to go, an’ the bloke said no you…
Where are the ideas?
The Conservative party conference in Birmingham this week seemed a remarkably relaxed affair. The European question has been settled. Seldom…
Syrian nightmare
‘We are used to death,’ said Ismail. He had been to the funerals of four friends in a single week,…
to 2278: Will Alterations
Concealed Shakespearean characters were Rivers, Celia, Celia (again), Hamlet, Costard, Polonius, Snug, Hero, Gallus, Martius, Pistol, Collatine (The Rape of…
Meet Boris Mark II
The make-up lady at the BBC’s Millbank studio in Westminster has noticed a change in Boris Johnson’s look. ‘His hair…
Dear Mary: Your problems solved
Q. A family of five from Brazil who are close friends of mine are visiting London next week. They have…
Brains for Trump
Last week more than 130 right-wing thinkers put their names to a defiant document — a list of ‘Scholars and…
Cover 8 October 2016 AU
The post Cover 8 October 2016 AU appeared first on The Spectator. Got something to add? Join the discussion and…
The students fight back
Last week, students at York University staged a walkout from the sexual consent classes organised by their student union women’s…
The Left’s foreign donors
A few weeks ago a trove of hacked documents detailed the international web of organisations nurtured by George Soros via…
Unhappy Pill
A study came out last week that should have caused great alarm. For 13 years, researchers at the University of Copenhagen studied…
Who comes after Merkel?
A year from now, 60 million Germans go to the polls in the most important general election in mainland Europe…
Trumped up
If Donald Trump keeps campaigning on immigration, he cannot lose. His Democrat rival for the US presidency, Hillary Clinton, has…
Why cathedrals are soaring
Something strange is happening in the long decline of Christian Britain. We know that church attendance has plummeted two thirds…
