Piratical
I have never met David Smerdon, the Australian grandmaster and author of Smerdon’s Scandinavian (Everyman Chess). Last week I gave…
No. 376
Black to play. This position is a variation from variation from Maslak-Smerdon, Pardubice 2007. Black has powered through on the…
Fan fare
In Competition No. 2912 you were invited to submit a tribute in verse to a once-popular foodstuff that has fallen…
Your problems solved
Q. How do you persuade someone drunk to leave a party when it doesn’t make sense for them to stay?…
A secluded paradise
Do-orzaat. Dorset is part of L’Angleterre profonde. It is possible to find evidence of modernity, but only in limited areas.…
Gamblin’ man
When George Osborne visited Sweden, Finland and Denmark the stock markets of each country promptly fell by about 5 per…
High life
According to Somerset Maugham, in material terms one must live on the razor edge between poverty and minimal subsistence in…
Long life
We learn from a new report that children in England are among the unhappiest in the world — more unhappy,…
Long life
We learn from a new report that children in England are among the unhappiest in the world — more unhappy,…
Low life
I sprinted through Milan station, speed-read the departures monitor without stopping, and arrived gasping on platform 8 with two minutes…
Low life
I sprinted through Milan station, speed-read the departures monitor without stopping, and arrived gasping on platform 8 with two minutes…
Names
We reached peak Charlie in 2012, when 5,571 baby boys were given the name. There were only 4,642 last year.…
Real life
On the basis that I might need a new boiler soon, I thought I had better sell the London flat…
French cowardice knows no bounds
Boy, am I glad I’m not a Frenchman. Last week’s dramatic incident on board a Paris-bound train, in which a…
French cowardice knows no bounds
Boy, am I glad I’m not a Frenchman. Last week’s dramatic incident on board a Paris-bound train, in which a…
Two industries in need of regulation
I had a water meter installed in my flat a few months ago. I looked at it just now and…
Man’s greed and gain
Laikipia An elephant can break through an electric fence by pulling out the posts, pushing younger, more stupid animals into…
Just how republican is Jeremy Corbyn?
True to his antique, bearded ideology, guru Corbyn is a ‘republican’, a form of government invented 2,500 years ago. ‘Republic’…
Barometer
How many cheats? More data on members of extramarital dating site Ashley Madison were put online. How widespread is adultery?…
Diary
There are many good reasons for being in Edinburgh in August, when the population doubles and nobody looks twice if…
Discovering Europe
From ‘A Converted Peace-Man’, The Spectator, 28 August 1915: We have brought the present war upon ourselves in a great measure…
Portrait of the week
Home Harriet Harman, the acting leader of the Labour party, said that 3,000 people had had any votes they cast…
All from nothing
Andrew Haigh’s 45 Years stars Charlotte Rampling and Tom Courtenay as a long married couple whose relationship is disturbed by…
God’s architect
Somewhat magnificently, I made the notes for this article sitting in the back of a Rolls-Royce travelling between London and…
