Theatre and transgression in Europe’s last dictatorship
Juan Holzmann goes underground in Minsk with the Belarus Free Theatre on the eve of their London festival, Staging a Revolution
Cameron’s Syrian stew
Cameron will not risk another humiliating defeat and the numbers simply don’t add up
Hot air summit
Rising carbon emissions are not a sign of western excess, but the result of the huge reduction in world poverty
Pope vs church
His scattershot reforms and wild statements make him look out of control to ordinary conservative Catholics
From the Big Smoke to the Big Choke
The sour yellow miasma forever (wrongly) associated with Sherlock Holmes and Jack the Ripper had been poisoning the capital for centuries, according to Christine Corton’s London Fog
M.C. Escher: limited, repetitive, but he deserves a place in art history
As does British abstract painter John Hoyland, who’s enjoying a revival courtesy of Damien Hirst’s beautiful new gallery on Newport Street
The Spectator’s notes
Plus: the house that Jacques built; ministers cannot comply with international law; more on Prof Sir Geoff Palmer; and cosmetic surgery
Portrait of the week
Home The all-party Foreign Affairs Committee urged David Cameron, the Prime Minister, not to press ahead with a Commons vote…
Who isn’t genderfluid?
‘There’s a moment happening’ on transgender issues. But it’s not as new as it looks
Where would America be without Gloria Steinem?, asks Carmen Callil
Steinem deserves universal recognition, but Life on the Road, her often stirring memoir, focuses too narrowly on the USA
Why can’t we get our minds around ME?
The poisonous emails, the threats, the rage – it’s all rooted in our crude attitude to psychiatric suffering
Northern Ireland Opera’s Turandot will fill you with awe and revulsion
Plus: Janet Suzman’s Marriage of Figaro for Royal Academy Opera is full of divine and sexy detail
Diary
Plus: Percy’s secret birthday party; the golden age of Hollywood; and a cameo in the new Ab Fab movie
Umberto Eco really tries our patience
It is hard to tell who knows what in Numero Zero, Eco’s deliberately confusing novel about blackmail, Musssolini’s double and an imaginary newspaper carrying yesterday’s news
Why should we listen to Benedict Cumberbatch on Syrian refugees?
Come to that, I wish all luvvies would just shut up and do what they’re supposed to do – in other words, act
Britain’s armed forces no longer have the resources for a major war
Military insiders reckon we’ve lost a third of our capabilities in the last five years. What will Cameron do about that?
Glyndebourne caters to the lower-middle classes not past-it toffs
Plus: a bold and unusual Old Vic production of an early Eugene O’Neill that zips past in 90 minutes
Long life
The Southern city is recovering from its recent hardships – but it’s not all plain sailing
Designing the swimming car, the Doodlebug and the Panzer tank was all in a day’s work for Ferdinand Porsche
Karl Ludvigsen describes how the engineering genius became a father-figure to Hitler and armed the Third Reich without really being a Nazi
I may have to revise my view that crypto-currencies are Satan’s work
Plus: Standard Chartered; Britain in the Prosperity Index; and does any bank really help small businesses?
How ancient Athens handled immigrants
Requiring sponsors is not a new idea – it was happening in Aristotle’s time
