The spending cuts Osborne flatly refused to make
Listen http://rss.acast.com/viewfrom22/thegreatfakewar/media.mp3 The Autumn Statement on 25 November had long been circled in Downing Street diaries as the season’s defining…
The Spectator’s notes
Because, it says, of its ‘liberal values and respect for human dignity’, the Economist has put out a film about…
I’m a Celebrity is like The Simpsons: good if you’re thick; even better if you’re not
The best bit in I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! (ITV) will be when the prisoners finally revolt…
The French might as well bomb Belgium
I am always open to spiritual guidance from any quarter, all the more so if that guidance is of practical…
A further selection of books of the year — the best and most overrated of 2015
Among regular reviewers choosing their favourite books are Craig Raine, Graham Robb, Hilary Spurling, Nicky Haslam, David Crane, Frances Wilson and Matthew Parris
Artificial life
Ruskin dismissed her early photographs as untrue. But the same could be said of any picture, says Martin Gayford
Obama’s failure is Putin’s opportunity
Determined to avoid repeating the mistakes of George W. Bush, he is making mistakes of his own that will have terrible consequences for decades to come
A better way
For a country to tolerate Britain’s level of immigration with no far-right backlash is nothing short of extraordinary
The deeper secrets of Britain’s submarines
Peter Hennessy and James Jinks disclose facts about the Royal Navy Submarine Service that might once have landed them in the dock
Lost in space
Her reputation has been in the doldrums for too long, undermined by ubiquity, then neglect. Djanogly Gallery's new show hopes to set the record straight
Low life
I encountered a single inoffensive pothole between Roscoff and Brignoles — around about the time Tennessee Williams finally lost his virginity
The Spectator’s Notes
The Paris atrocities, BBC rolling news, the right to criticise Islam, President Rouhani’s French dinner
Portrait of the week
Home After the killings in Paris, David Cameron, the Prime Minister, said that seven terrorist attacks on Britain had been…
The politics of terror
The aftermath of the Paris terror attacks is looking ominously good for the Front National
Samuel Palmer: from long-haired mystic to High Church Tory
William Vaughan’s biography shows how the idealistic painter of Arcadia became an established artist with a strong commercial sense
Death watch
The rituals that followed the death of a French king included the complete dismembering of the body, as this new exhibition at Versailles shows
There’s a right way to lose at the Oxford Union. I did the wrong way
They don’t do humour, the Stepford Students. So I’d give it to them straight
Real life
My first words to my Aussie airbnb customers were: ‘It is really really important that you do not get on a bus.’
Ian Rankin’s diary: Paris, ignoring Twitter and understanding evil
Plus: three generations of remembrance; and the Ottawa bar that always features on my tour schedule
Jeremy Corbyn isn’t anti-war. He’s just anti-West
And his inability to state his true beliefs defines his leadership of the Labour party
The view from my Belfast bus: tribalism as the enemy of prosperity
Plus: Is Dublin overheating again?
Shock and awe in Coventry, 14 November 1940
Coventry was Hitler’s test case for a new kind of war — one of total destruction — and Frederick Taylor’s book makes for painful reading
Through terror and scandal, the joy of sport endures
The attack on the Stade de France – and the Wembley friendly that followed – reminded us of sport’s true glory and beauty
