Second world war

Jonathan Raban’s last hurrah

16 September 2023 9:00 am

Aged 69, the travel writer had a stroke and spent his last 20 years as a hemiplegic – and writing this memoir of his father’s life intertwined with snapshots of his own

Letter from Latvia

15 July 2023 9:00 am

I may never recover: Sisu reviewed

27 May 2023 9:00 am

When I went into the Sisu screening I knew only that it was a Finnish film, so was expecting an…

Sad, blinkered and incoherent: Arcola’s The Misandrist reviewed

20 May 2023 9:00 am

A new play, The Misandrist, looks at modern dating habits. Rachel is a smart, self-confident woman whose partner is a…

My lunch with the Queen

17 September 2022 9:00 am

None of this would have happened had I accepted my neighbour’s invitation to dine with a Swiss billionaire banker, or…

Spare us the preaching: The Railway Children Return reviewed

30 July 2022 9:00 am

It doesn’t help the cause of The Railway Children Return that the original 1970 Railway Children film is currently on…

In praise of Greek royalty

4 June 2022 9:00 am

New York Prince Pavlos, heir to the Greek throne, turned 55 recently and I threw a small dinner for him.…

Fascinating exhibitions – clunky editorialising: Breaking the News at the British Library reviewed

7 May 2022 9:00 am

In The Spectator office’s toilets there are framed front covers of the events that didn’t happen: Corbyn beats Boris; ‘Here’s…

Mostly gripping – and boasts not one but two Mr Darcys: Operation Mincemeat reviewed

16 April 2022 9:00 am

Operation Mincemeat is based on the book by Ben Macintyre, which in turn is based on what Sir Hugh Trevor-Roper…

The moral courage of P.J. O’Rourke

26 February 2022 9:00 am

Was it Socrates who said that chaos was the natural state of mankind, and tyranny the usual remedy? Actually it…

Robert Harris on Boris Johnson, cancel culture and rehabilitating Chamberlain

22 January 2022 9:00 am

Nigel Jones talks to the writer Robert Harris about Blair, Johnson and Polanski, cancel culture and his quest to rehabilitate Neville Chamberlain

The forgotten story of the pioneering surgeon who healed disfigured airmen

27 November 2021 9:00 am

Lloyd Evans on a musical that tells the story of the pioneering maverick whose methods for treating disfigured second world war airmen revolutionised plastic surgery

Can the fiasco of the Dieppe Raid really be excused?

6 November 2021 9:00 am

In my mother’s final days we had a long conversation about the second world war. I asked if she’d ever…

Grimy, echt and gripping: Netflix's The Forgotten Battle reviewed

30 October 2021 9:00 am

The Forgotten Battle is a Dutch feature film commemorating the desperate and relatively little-known Allied assault on the Scheldt estuary…

I miss life before Big Tech

2 October 2021 9:00 am

Do any of you remember the time when everything took place on the terraces and in outdoor cafés? Before everyone…

The art of the pillbox

4 September 2021 9:00 am

Laura Gascoigne on the art of pillboxes

Churchill as villain – but is this a character assassination too far?

14 August 2021 9:00 am

Revisionist biographies of Churchill are nothing new but this one lays the hostility and contempt on with a trowel, says Andrew Roberts

One for hardcore Tennessee Williams fans only: The Two Character Play reviewed

31 July 2021 9:00 am

It can be difficult to remember that Tennessee Williams, the great songster of the Deep South during the 1950s, was…

What really went on at Britain's Bikini Atoll?

31 July 2021 9:00 am

Stuart Jeffries takes the ferry to Orford Ness, a strange shingle spit on the Suffolk coast, where art mingles with death

Walking the Somme

17 July 2021 9:00 am

Where the 36th (Ulster) Division attacked at 7.30 a.m. on the first morning of the Battle of the Somme in…

Britain is in danger of repeating its post-war mistakes

17 April 2021 9:00 am

What we can learn from Britain’s rationing mistakes

The dark history of dance marathons

27 March 2021 9:00 am

Stuart Jeffries on the dark history of dance marathons

The sufferings of Okinawa continue today unheard

20 March 2021 9:00 am

Okinawa is having a moment. Recently a Telegraph travel destination, to many in the west it’s still unfamiliar except as…

Churchill’s enigma: the real riddle is why he cosied up to Stalin

20 March 2021 9:00 am

The real riddle is why he cosied up to Stalin

Lives unlived: Light Perpetual, by Francis Spufford, reviewed

30 January 2021 9:00 am

Francis Spufford was already admired as a non-fiction writer when he published his prize-winning first novel, On Golden Hill, in…