Life
It is time to fight for the future of racing
Fortunately for me and the politicians we entertained over my years covering the darkest profession, Mrs Oakley didn’t do a…
Bridge | 17 October 2020
‘I have a wonderful hand to show you,’ Gunnar Hallberg exclaimed when I saw him last week. Gunnar is a…
Chess players on ice
We are what we do. Alas, in its zeal to suppress the virus, this government would have many people doing…
No. 626
Rapport–Sprenger, Bundesliga, September 2020. The game continued 1 Bxc4 Rxc4 2 Bxe5+ f6 3 Bf4 Rxe4+ 4 Kf3 and was…
2479: Shielded
The unclued lights (one of two words and one hyphened) are of a kind, verifiable in Brewer. Across 10 United…
2476: Playtime solution
The unclued lights form pairs of famous soloists and the instruments they play; 1A/19, 5/34, 23/8, 31/39, 43/16A. First prize…
Spectator competition winners: Shakespeare lays down the law
In Competition No. 3170, a challenge inspired by Shelley’s assertion that ‘poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world’, you…
Aussie Life & Language
Brendan Ward A re-run of Cathy Freeman’s heart-stopping 400 metre race at the Sydney Olympics in September 2000 recently animated…
Kiwi Life
Once upon a time here in New Zealand, when political dinosaurs still roamed the earth, Prime Minister Keith Holyoake startled…
Bridge | 10 October 2020
One of the things that makes bridge so endlessly fascinating is that it is forever changing and growing. At high…
My nights of passion with Juliette Gréco
Gstaad Juliette Gréco’s recent death in her nineties brought back some melodramatic memories. In 1957 Gréco was one of France’s…
How I won €160 by mistake
My French friend André speaks perfect English and is the kindest of men. After reading last week about my futile…
The lunacy of customer service in the time of Covid
‘Please be aware there is now a Covid surcharge,’ I told the builder boyfriend one morning, as we discussed the…
No. 625
Black to play. Khodashneli — Willow, European Online Youth Championship U18, September 2020. White has just advanced 40 g3-g4, and…
2478: Namesakes
Clockwise round the grid from 3 run three song titles (totalling 13 words) with 3D/16 (five words in all) giving…
Keats and Covid: poems about autumn
In Competition No. 3169 you were invited to submit a poem about autumn in which the last letter of each…
2475: Poem VI - solution
The poem was The Brook by Alfred Tennyson. The words were HERN (8A), LINGER (20), BRIMMING (32A), FLOW (40), TROUT…
A trout in the milk?
I can’t tell you why the Armenian grandmaster Tigran Petrosian was found guilty of cheating last month, because I don’t…
The Battle for Britain | 10 October 2020
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Boris Johnson’s human shield
At a Conservative party conference fringe event last Sunday, Lord Bethell, a health minister, was asked where he thought Britain…
The best food Italy can offer: Giannino Mayfair reviewed
Pity the gilded restaurants of Mayfair, if you can: they are dying. Some have reopened; they ache on like men…
Dear Mary: How can my celebrity husband still be recognised in a face mask?
Q. I am running out of suitable responses to a friend who now has the slightest possible connection to one…
Let’s talk about sex: the brilliance of ‘bonk’
I take it personally that a word I practically saw being born is now unrecognised by people almost old enough…
Football is better without the crowds
The Liverpool defence might have decided in a rare show of togetherness to demonstrate what the word ‘appalling’ means, and…
Aussie Life
It is the season of hyperbole. Conservative columnists are finding parallels for Dan Andrews’ pandemic policy in Mao’s Great Leap…
