Evelyn Waugh
Barbara Ker-Seymer – Bright Young Person in the shadows
Though she photographed many society figures of the 1930s, Ker-Seymer lacked ambition and remains largely unknown – as she herself seems to have wanted
The power of prayerful washing-up
My days pass largely in a state of inanition. The fit and able-bodied express their sympathy, claiming it’s much the…
When Oxford life resembled a great satirical novel
Paula Byrne describes life at Oxford University in its eccentric heyday
The novels that became instant classics
In the world of books, a modern classic is an altogether more slippery thing than a classic: it must walk…
Granada’s Brideshead Revisited remains the sine qua non of mini-series
Sumptuous, glorious, luminous, lavish: Granada’s 40-year-old adaptation of Brideshead Revisited remains the sine qua non of mini-series, says Mark McGinness
The bizarre art of Scottie Wilson deserves to be better known
On eBay I have an alert set for ‘Scottie Wilson’. Nine times out of ten, it’s a diamanté Scottie dog…
Hidin’ Biden’s basement convention
Not everyone appreciates the extent to which the Democrats pushing Joe Biden for president are students of Samuel Taylor Coleridge.…
Letters: why is the C of E still messing around with the Carlile report?
The Carlile report Sir: The Bishop of Bath and Wells tells us (Letters, 2 December) that nobody is holding up…
Of his time
Great novelists come in all shapes and sizes, but one thing they all share is a status of half-belonging. If…
All’s fair in love and Waugh
I was reminded of Wild West films from boyhood. Then, the beleaguered garrison scanned the horizon; would the US cavalry…
Rumbles in the jungle
A CIA agent, a naive young filmmaker, a dilettante heir and a lost Mayan temple form the basis of Ned…
Torn between envy and contempt
Arriving at boarding school with the wrong shoes and a teddy bear in his suitcase, the hero of Elizabeth Day’s…
Let Evelyn Waugh back into Combe Florey churchyard
My father, Evelyn Waugh, enjoyed pretending to be a horror. He wasn’t
The consolations of old age
OK sports fans, what do Dame Vivien Duffield and Evelyn Waugh have in common? The answer is absolutely nothing, so…
The King of Kings and I: Haile Selassie, by his great nephew
Great men rarely come smaller than Haile Selassie. In photographs, the golden crowns, pith helmets and grey felt homburgs he…
The strange creatures of Clubland, from Evelyn Waugh to the oligarchs
When it comes to nightclubs, many have written, but none has surpassed the Perroquet in Debra Dowa. Le tout Debra…
John Freeman: polymath or psychopath?
They don’t make Englishmen like the aptly named John Freeman any more. When he died last Christmas just shy of…
Why I love undertakers
By looking after the dead, funeral directors allow the living to love and mourn them
Call myself a Low life? You lot put me to shame
The entries are crawling in on their hands and knees for the ‘drunkest I’ve ever been’ competition to win a…
An innocent abroad defies South Africa’s insane colour code
At the eye of apartheid South Africa’s storm of insanities was a mania for categorisation. Everything belonged in its place,…
Max Hastings’s diary: The joys of middle age, and Prince Charles’s strange letters
I am living in rustic seclusion while writing a book. Our only cultural outing of the week was to Newbury…
Back to Bedlam: Patrick Skene Catling on the book that makes madness visible
Madness is an ancient, evidently inscrutable mystery, often regarded with superstitious fear, yet can provide a refuge from reality. Sometimes,…
You realise how little you know of anybody when they die
Whether or not you believe in the afterlife, death remains an impenetrable mystery. One moment a person is making jokes…
Bidding a fond, and drunken, farewell to the awe-inspiring Mark Amory
Rubbing shoulders with political suits on the pavement outside the Westminster Arms, I drank two pints of Spitfire. Pump primed,…
Why it’s time for a Cad of the Year Award
Why it’s time for a Cad of the Year Award
