Portrait of the week
Home David Cameron, the Prime Minister, visited New York for talks at the United Nations; he said Britain supported the…
Barometer
The strange places where marijuana plants have sprung up; plus, what would an English parliament look like?
Salmond’s demagoguery
He doesn’t like the verdict of the people, so he threatens to declare independence anyway
We always end up talking to terrorists, one way or another
We may pretend we don’t negotiate, but in private we natter away like there’s no tomorrow
Can brutalised jihadis be saved?
A former Liberian warlord persuaded me that it is possible to rehumanise monstrous men
The Soul
The soul is like a little mouse. He hides inside the body’s house With anxious eyes and twitchy nose As…
Artists’ houses
I’m not sure what took me to Salvador Dalí’s house in Port Lligat, but it sure as hell wasn’t admiration.…
Looking and listening
A review of ‘Rendez-vous with Art’, by Philippe de Montebello and Martin Gayford. It’s a minor miracle that this book doesn’t lapse into self-indulgent meandering
Values
The final way we’re held to account is the standing order we never chose. To whatever our lives might amount,…
Boastful and bored
A review of ‘Only When I Laugh: My Autobiography’, by Paul Merton. He writes candidly about his psychiatric incarceration but, elsewhere, there’s too much swanking
Title Stories: ‘Sketches by Boz’ by Charles Dickens
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Drama in the mouth
A review of ‘Plenty More’, by Yotam Ottolenghi. If you can make sense of this cook’s unpronounceable ingredients, you should have a delicious meal
I believe in yesterday
A review of ‘Please, Mister Postman’, by Alan Johnson. This second instalment of the former minister’s autobiography takes us from the urban jungle of Notting Hill to the cusp of political power
The political prophet
A review of ‘Political Order and Political Decay’, by Francis Fukuyama. This excellent volume of comparative history and political science should be read by politicians and public alike
The wisdom of language
A review of ‘The Edge of Words: God and the Habits of Language’, by Rowan Williams. Atheists have nothing to fear from this attempt to find a proof for God in linguistic philosophy
Director’s cut
A review of ‘I Joke Too Much: The Theatre Director’s Tale’, by Michael Rudman. Despite the dearth of score-settling, there’s a good laugh on almost every page
Home is where his heart is
A review of ‘How To Be A Conservative’, by Roger Scruton. He ends with a passionate, romantic appeal on behalf of western society
A hint of the numinous
A review of ‘The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher: Stories’, by Hilary Mantel. There’s a lot of horror, plenty of wraiths and a fair bit of humour in these contemporary short stories
Net effect
The work of Austin Lee and Ed Fornieles embodies what culture might be were it filtered entirely through social media
A kind of magic
Whether with subject matter, paint or the palette knife, the 17th century Dutch master was a magician
Nobs and numbskulls
Plus: no less dramatic illiteracy is to be found in Howard Brenton’s Doctor Scroggy’s War at Shakespeare’s Globe
Husband and wives
Plus: James Walton finds a cunning combination of familiar elements in BBC1’s drama The Driver
