Torture
What hope is there for Syria today?
After two brutal regimes and a devastating civil war, there’s fear of renewed corruption under President Ahmed al Sharaa, a former al Qaeda terrorist
The enlightened rule of the Empress Maria Theresa
‘She hates to see anyone put to death’, said one contemporary of the monarch who abolished torture and serfdom and pioneered the practice of open weekly audiences with the public
Seeds of hope in the siege of Leningrad
A Russian biologist’s dream of creating the world’s first seed bank is thwarted by Stalin’s paranoia and the Nazi invasion. But the pioneering project remains a potent symbol of hope
The firebrand preacher who put Martin Luther in the shade
Andrew Drummond traces the short, turbulent career of Thomas Müntzer, the rabble-rousing revolutionary behind the peasants’ uprising in 1520s Germany
Hell on Earth
More than 100 interviews with surviving detainees and former prison workers reveal how profoundly shocking President Assad’s regime continues to be
Nasty, brutish and short
As Tory writers reflected on the safe passage of the Stuart dynasty through the Exclusion Crisis of 1679-81, an anonymous…
Last-minute reprieve
A bully-boy leader. A corrupt, out-of-touch regime. A twisted reading of history. An unprovoked, military-led landgrab. A domestic disinformation blitz.…
House of horrors
If the last quarter of 2020 saw a glut of novels published, of which there were winners (Richard Osman) and…
The cheapest, deadliest weapon
Nothing prepared Antony Beevor for this devastating exposé of the systematic use of rape in war and ethnic cleansing
Do the Americans know who they’re fighting in Afghanistan — or why?
Early every morning through the spring of 2002, US troops at Bagram airfield on the Shomali plains north of Kabul…
A grand inquisitor
Hidden behind Kensington Palace, in one of London’s smartest streets, there is a grand old house which played a leading…
Mao devours his foes
Frank Dikötter, professor of humanities at the University of Hong Kong and winner of the Samuel Johnson prize in 2011,…
More blood and tears
Irvine Welsh’s 1993 debut novel Train-spotting flicked a hearty V-sign in the face of alarm-clock Britain. ‘Ah choose no tae…
Trapped in hell
The mechanic, blinded in one eye by shrapnel, spent three days searching for his family in the destroyed buildings and…
Communism kills
We need a museum to help us remember that
Letter from Paris
Like many journalists, I’m a bit of a know-it-all — when information is touted as ‘new’, especially in government reports,…
Plumbing the depths of horror
Concentration camps in Nazi Germany were originally set up in 1933 to terrorise Hitler’s political enemies; as war drew near,…
The burning issue of the age
Some reviewers are slick and quick. Rapid readers, they remember everything, take no notes, quote at will. I’m the plodding…
Real life
Strangely enough, I was in the middle of writing an article about the tactics used by the RSPCA when another…
Divinely decadent
With an eye to the blasphemy underlying some of the loveliest Renaissance painting, Honor Clerk will be choosing her Christmas cards more carefully this year
