France
Low life
Feeling oddly confident, clairvoyant even, I entered a bar to place a bet on Sunday’s Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe.…
Low life
Scotching my bright idea of a stiff gin for Dutch courage in the bar across the road, Catriona bounded straight…
What cinema is for
Cuties is the subject of a moral panic and a hashtag #CancelNetflix. It tells the story of Amy (Fathia Youssouf),…
Low life
Hairpin bends in a stony forest. Downhill. Steep, then steeper. Smooth frictionless tarmac. I’ve got the car barely under control.…
Low life
The old dog was in a companionable frame of mind and she trotted along at my side, glancing up now…
The Atlantic twists the truth
The Atlantic has stunk up an otherwise beautiful Labor Day weekend with a uniquely ugly story. Anti-Trump editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg claims that…
Low life
The Moulinards had inhabited the old stone hilltop house for centuries, ekeing out a hard living among the sun-baked boulders.…
A taste of the continent
Is it safe to visit the continent? On the one hand, abroad is likely to be less crowded this August…
Bonjour happiness
Soon, very soon now — even sooner than I imagined, if A Suitable Boy turns out to be as lacklustre…
Low life
Provence-Alpes-Côte D’Azur Until January the foreign correspondent lived in a late-18th-century house with a vineyard, olive grove and vegetable garden…
Has France been naive in its handling of Huawei?
The controversy over the UK’s use of Huawei equipment in its 5G network has not abated, despite the government’s announcement…
Low life
Phone calls aside, the only human contact I had on my ten-day Somme battlefield tour was with the lady who…
Macron’s new sidekick
Is France’s latest prime minister just another fall guy?
Low life
Avid Spectator reader Mr Brown had endured the very strictest of lockdowns for family health reasons in Tunbridge Wells. Since…
Plan to fail
How was Britain so ill-prepared for a pandemic?
Low life
Chatting on the café terrace with my new friends Didier and Emile made me aware that certain political ideas, which…
Low life
I took a table on the terrace of the reopened bar and ordered une pression from the waitress. ‘Back to…
Low life
I walked to the salon in fiery sunshine. Gorgeous, zaftig Elody was wearing a short satin dressing gown of silver…
Taking French leave
With more than a dozen acclaimed novels to her name, not to mention short stories, poetry, a memoir and a…
Low life
The most visible local landmark is a solitary two-headed Jurassic mountain called Le Bessillon, six miles long and 800 metres…
Low life
France is divided into a red zone and a green zone. We’re green. Green for go. From this morning we…
Breaking out
Lifting lockdown is a worldwide experiment
Low life
They made a better job of sorting out my waterworks
Covid statistics are just politics by other means
Statistics is the continuation of politics by other means, to misquote Clausewitz. One hundred and fifty years after the crushing…
Low life
Once a week we break French emergency law and have a friend round for drinks on the terrace. The terrace…
