Portrait of the week
Home People living in Scotland voted in a referendum that asked: ‘Should Scotland be an independent country?’ A great deal…
Forewarned is forearmed
They'd like that he doesn't admit to having one. Apart from that, however...
From the archives
From ‘A review of the war’, The Spectator, 19 September 1914: It is the duty of all English publicists to make…
Letters
Breaking the unions Sir: By the time this letter appears we shall know whether the land of my birth has…
It’s hard to refute stereotypes about British people being a bit disgusting
We drink, fight and shag too much. Not all of us, but enough for a Portuguese bestseller
I’ll never feel the same about the Scots
Most English people I know wanted Scotland to stay, but only if the Scots themselves really want to
The ‘no’ campaign’s problem was that it sounded like me
Were all Scotland’s credible populist figures in favour of independence? Or were the rest just scared to speak out?
Botín’s not-so-dark secret of banking success: simple rules, smart technology and team spirit
Plus: Oil prices and other Scottish questions
Mr Dixon
I can’t think of anyone else still alive who knew him, and could reminisce with me about his special kindness,…
To catch a killer
Politicians’ promises to bring those who murder British hostages to justice almost never come true
A slap in the Facebook
I love my Facebook friends. They make me feel young again. But the fighting is preposterous
Anglican disunion
The Anglican Mission in England looks like a support group. But if required, it could turn into rather more than that
‘I don’t see the wisdom there once was’
The former US Secretary of State, now 91, on statesmanship from Richelieu to Obama
Deal
It's not as rough as it was in Daniel Defoe's day, but it remains a town for people who won't be told what to do
A Blanche Dubois of a book
Thomas W. Hodgkinson says John Lahr’s ‘standalone’ new account of the life of the playwright, ‘Tennessee Williams: Mad Pilgrimage of the Flesh’, would be better if it didn't have to stand alone
An old classic in a new light
A review of ‘Crime and Punishment’, by Fyodor Dostoevsky, translated by Oliver Ready. It sheds new light on an old classic
Shades of the classroom
A review of ‘Civil War’, by Peter Ackroyd. There is a fascination in watching the construction of a narrative that accommodates so little analysis
Shaping divinity to our ends
A review of ‘Fields of Blood: Religion and the History of Violence’, by Karen Armstrong. The former nun makes a convincing case that religions are corrupted by success
Title Stories: ‘The Waste Land’ by T.S.Eliot
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Not a foot wrong
A review of ‘I Knew the Bride’, by Hugo Williams. A marvellous, memorious collection drawn to the second world war and family heartache
