Features
Britain needs to join the new space race
Elon Musk’s Starship is the biggest rocket ever built. Sending it into space is hard; bringing it back to Earth,…
Love it or loathe it, ragwort is winning
White, lacy cow parsley frothing along the roadside is a familiar sight during the British summer. But 2024 is the…
Beware the bat police
My friend Andrew is angry. He has just had the bat people round to look at his building project in…
Let prisoners phone home
‘A society is measured by the treatment of its prisoners,’ Winston Churchill said. Last year, in England and Wales, every…
Keir Starmer’s plans to soften Brexit
Anew political bromance is brewing on the continent. Keir Starmer has met Olaf Scholz, his German counterpart, three times since…
The cult of Bedales
Another of my ageing Bedales school cohort has died and so there’s an ad hoc reunion in his honour at…
The mystery of teaching composition
Summer study courses for young composers have been popular for a few generations. After the second world war, up-and-coming experimental…
Woody Johnson: What a second Trump term would mean for the UK
If Donald Trump does return to the White House, then another restoration could soon follow. Woody Johnson, a confidant of…
Venn diagrams are the perfect tool for a politician
‘I just love Venn diagrams,’ Kamala Harris said in 2022. ‘It’s just something about those three circles, the analysis about…
Aliens exist? Prove it
At Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio there is, it is rumoured, a secret underground room where a crashed alien…
The rise of the ‘divorce influencer’
On Woman’s Hour recently, Anita Rani and her guests set out to celebrate the positive sides of a woman’s midlife.…
A visit to the world’s worst capital city
Nouakchott in Mauritania is often referred to as the ‘worst capital city in the world’. That may be a little…
The plotting to find the next Pope
The Hollywood adaptation of Conclave, Robert Harris’s thriller about a conspiracy to rig a papal election, won’t be in cinemas…
Olympics on steroids: the millionaire behind the Enhanced Games
Aron D’Souza likes to celebrate the new year with Peter Thiel, the venture capitalist billionaire who is good friends with…
How supporting Trump became cool
For the past decade, the basic lines of conflict in American public life seemed clear. Donald Trump was pitted against…
Evita meets Thatcher: the woman fighting Venezuela’s autocracy
Maria Corina Machado is showing the world how opposition politicians can fight an autocrat. When President Nicolas Maduro tried to…
The joy of party bags
The perfect, unpretentious, well-constructed party bag was given to guests leaving a recent Hatchards party. It contained a wedge of…
The curious rise of Kamala Harris
I’m struck just in your presence,’ a news anchor gushed to Kamala Harris in January. The Vice President beamed, nodding…
Does Donald fear Kamala?
On Monday, Donald J. Trump sent out an urgent campaign memo. ‘Joe Biden just dropped out of the race, and…
Up, up and down again: my attempt to balloon the Atlantic
I was hoping to fly the first hydrogen balloon across the Atlantic and had been waiting for a year to…
‘Nationalise Google!’: the techno-optimists hoping to save the world
Future House is a weird private members’ club. There’s a mattress on the floor for napping, a bathtub designed to…
Keep Michelin men out of our hotels!
It’s probably escaped most people’s attention, what with the football, the election, the Ukraine war, the horrors of Gaza, the…
Trump is stronger than ever
‘You’re gonna be so blessed,’ said Pastor James Roemke, doing a pretty good Donald Trump impersonation in the warm-up to…
Why Trump forgave J.D. Vance
It shows a remarkable level of confidence from Donald Trump that he’s chosen for his running-mate the man who once…
