Maestro maker
When Margaret Thatcher imagined perfect power, she thought of the orchestral conductor. ‘She envied me,’ said Herbert von Karajan, ‘that…
Maestro maker
When Margaret Thatcher imagined perfect power, she thought of the orchestral conductor. ‘She envied me,’ said Herbert von Karajan, ‘that…
The Durable Postie
(For Karl) He doesn’t even bother to change out of his uniform, just goes straight to the pub after…
Constitutional smoking ceremony
The push for changing our Constitution to recognise explicitly the special status in Australia of Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders…
Contagion of a different kind as Greece wriggles off the hook
The clear winner in the Greek crisis is the author of The Little Book of Negotiating Clichés, whose royalties must…
How Taylor Swift socked it to Apple over a weekend
All hail Taylor Swift. How she must give baby boomers the fear. Not just baby boomers. Also those who came…
Spy if you must, but don’t give the game away
The Snoopers’ Charter. I ought to care about this. I’m a sort of libertarian. I believe in personal freedom. I’m…
Europe’s great game
Listen http://rss.acast.com/viewfrom22/angelamerkel-sburden/media.mp3 For generations, ambitious politicians have dreamed about having the power to run Europe — but as Angela Merkel…
The Spectator’s notes
People write about ‘Grexit’ and ‘Brexit’ as if they were the same, but they need not be. Grexit is about…
Look back in anger
‘Cringe!’ said Boy, after I’d exposed him to a few seconds of last week’s special nostalgia edition of TFI Friday.…
Diary
The last Parliamentary fortnight before the winter recess begins with the focus on national security, amid claims that the Abbott…
Australian notes
I had occasion the other day to dig up a piece I had written 50 years ago for Geoffrey Dutton’s…
The questions you don’t ask at the BBC
There was a remarkable scene in one BBC Today programme morning meeting in about 1995, as all the producers gathered…
Portrait of the week
Home Talha Asmal, aged 17, from Dewsbury, West Yorkshire, died in a suicide bomb attack on forces near an oil…
Aristotle on the Lego chair
The great philosopher wasn’t one to overlook the apparently trivial; but he didn’t share our sentimentality about childhood
Birdsong
From ‘Literature and Soldiers’, The Spectator, 19 June 1915: In this war some of the most moving poetry has been written…
Letters
Plus: Peter Hitchens and Alasdair Lexden on David Cameron, and a new theory on Dear Mary’s buttons
Does Labour still not get it?
By not staying on as caretaker leader, he has ensured his party plots its course in panic and ignorance
The Spectator’s Notes
Plus: the Magna Carta’s overlooked first clause; and how I fought bravely at Waterloo
Is suicide bombing now a Yorkshire tradition?
Life has changed in Dewsbury and Bradford. We've let people there down – but not in the way the bien pensants tell you
Are schoolgirls fair game for teachers?
I can feel sorry for those who are pursued as I pursued poor Mr W. But I can't accept their self-justifications
Oh God, don’t let the Pope be a climate fanatic
I thought he’d just been lobbied heavily. Now it’s starting to look worse than that
