British empire
Jan Morris’s ‘national treasure’ status is misleading
Almost two years after the death of Jan Morris, the jaunty travel writer and pioneer of modern gender transition, her…
The uncomfortable lessons of the new Fourth Plinth statues
Alexander Chula on the uncomfortable lessons of the new Fourth Plinth statues
Does the curriculum really need ‘decolonising’?
Layla Moran, the Lib Dems’ education spokesman, has written to Gavin Williamson urging him to do something about ‘systemic racism’…
We should build more memorials to controversial people
It is hard to find benign examples of imperialism
In defence of the British Empire
Is it my imagination, or are the whitened bones of the British Empire being yet again dug up and trampled…
Labour won’t win voters back by denigrating Britain’s past
They never learn, do they? Lisa Nandy, the dark horse candidate in the Labour leadership race, has demanded the word…
The forgotten masterpieces of Indian art
As late as the end of the 18th century, only a handful of Europeans had ever seen the legendary Mughal…
This election will change Britain – and Europe – for good
This election campaign feels unreal. Commentators focus on spending plans and personal foibles, but what will make next week’s vote…
Shameless and corny: ITV’s Beecham House reviewed
ITV’s new drama Beecham House is set in late 18th-century India where the British and French were still battling it…
One of the best plays I’ve ever seen: I and You at the Hampstead Theatre reviewed
Lauren Gunderson’s play I and You opens in the scruffy bedroom of 17-year-old Caroline. Lonely, beautiful and furious, she’s unable…
The dumbing down of the Reith Lectures
It’s been a heavyweight week on Radio 4 with the start of the annual series of Reith Lectures and a…
Playing it safe
BBC1’s latest Sunday-night drama The Last Post, about a British military base in Aden in 1965, feels like a programme…
Catherine Tate’s talents are wasted on this meandering musical about nuclear fallout
Miss Atomic Bomb celebrates the sub-culture that grew up around nuclear tests in 1950s America. The citizens of Nevada would…
Flying from Donald Trump to the beautiful ruins of another empire
Just as the presidential race in America started to get really crazy, I left for India. On the morning of…
What to do about Syria – the view from 1916
From ‘The future of Syria’, The Spectator, 5 February 1916: We say with all the emphasis at our command, and…
Artistic taste is inversely proportional to political nous
‘Wherever the British settle, wherever they colonize,’ observed the painter Benjamin Robert Haydon, ‘they carry and will ever carry trial…
The students tearing down Cecil Rhodes’s statue are still upholding his legacy
Protesting students in Cape Town may disdain the statue of Cecil Rhodes, yet they do not reject his legacy
Gymkhana is morally disgusting – and fortunately the food’s disgusting too
Gymkhana is a fashionable Indian restaurant in Albemarle Street. It was, according to its natty website, ‘inspired by Colonial Indian…
A Labour MP defends the Empire – and only quotes Lenin twice
In a grand history of the British empire — because that is what this book really is — you might…
When Britain Burned the White House, by Peter Snow - review
Peter Snow explains that he decided to look into this extraordinary story when he realised how few people knew about…
