The Greeks were right: Trump shouldn’t live for revenge
Donald Trump’s book on business Think Big and Kick Ass makes taking personal revenge a very high priority. Given recent…
Limp and lifeless: Freud’s Last Session reviewed
Freud’s Last Session stars Anthony Hopkins and Matthew Goode and is a work of speculative fiction asking what would have…
There’s something very wrong with children’s history books
The first editor I worked for was Charles Moore and, like many of his old and ageing former staff, I…
How to decode adspeak
The National Galleries of Scotland is singular. In its public pronouncements its pronouns are it and its. Fair enough. Though…
Who dictates how we see the past?
Three weeks ago, I received an SOS from a distressed citizen of Glasgow, urging me to protest against a recently…
Hard to get to grips with: Marie Curie: The Musical reviewed
Marie Curie: The Musical is a history lesson combined with a chemistry seminar and it’s aimed at indignant feminists who…
A fitting – and lovable – tribute to Frederick Ashton
I encountered Frederick Ashton at a dinner party shortly before he died in 1988. Frail and anxious, he clutched my…
‘I want every production I do to be the funniest’: an interview with Cal McCrystal
There are certain things that you don’t expect at the opera. Laughter, for example. Proper laughter, that is; not the…
Why would Labour be anti-racing?
Enjoying the election? It was a colleague from my days with CNN who alerted me during Donald Trump’s first contest…
My dreams of Jeremy Clarke
The other week my eldest daughter and I were staying with friends in Richmond for the launch of Jeremy’s third…
Nigel Farage is right: the City should not kowtow to Shein
Nigel Farage and I agree on one thing: a red-carpet welcome at the London Stock Exchange for Shein, the Chinese…
How to make elderflower cordial
I have a complicated relationship with elderflower cordial. I love taking ingredients that have short seasons, preserving and squirrelling them…
My brush with doom in Tangier
I wait till early summer to spring-clean so I’m moving my study, a stirring-up that invariably releases powerful methane from…
What was in the first manifesto?
Made manifest What was in the first manifesto? The word ‘manifesto’ is first recorded as being used in English in…
What tax rises are Labour planning?
The Tory manifesto is ‘a clear plan’ promising ‘bold action’. Rishi Sunak uses the word ‘bold’ three times in two…
Can Macron still outplay Le Pen?
Petulance, panic and performance. President Macron’s broadcast following the evisceration of his party in last weekend’s elections for the European…
The return of Douglas Alexander
It’s a sunny Friday afternoon in Gullane, an affluent seaside town on the Firth of Forth. For political campaigners, golden…
How the Tories lost their way
Do you pack up the flat or not? That’s the question that everyone who lives in Downing Street faces as…
Portrait of the Week: Sunak’s D-Day misstep, Michael Mosley’s death and Macron’s snap election
Home The Conservatives promised to reduce National Insurance from 8 per cent to 6 per cent (and abolish it for…
The danger of a Labour supermajority
We are witnessing what could well be the last few weeks of a constrained Labour party. Sir Keir Starmer is…
Why Britain isn’t following Europe rightwards
My father was fond of telling anyone who would listen that Britain would never entertain fascism because we all had…
Puzzle no. 805
White to play. Adapted from an example in Capablanca’s classic manual Chess Fundamentals. Only one move leads to a win…
The unlikely political resurrection of Keith Vaz
When Keith Vaz announced his ambition to stand as an independent for Leicester East in the general election, no one…
