Life
What kind of life-form boasts that it can ‘speak human’?
The next Labour leader will have to be able to speak human, said a piece in the Observer. This, it…
Battle for Britain
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Dark lord
A new book, Opening Repertoire: The Nimzo-Indian and Bogo-Indian by Christof Seilecki (Everyman Chess), focuses on the ever popular Nimzo-Indian…
No. 367
Black to play. This is from Spassky-Fischer, World Championship, Reykjavik (Game 5) 1972. This is probably the most famous ‘dark-square’…
Howzat!
In Competition No. 2903 you were invited to supply a poem incorporating a dozen cricketing terms. English poets love cricket:…
Your problems solved
Q. I was at the theatre recently and bumped into a well-known Liverpudlian crooner coming out of the disabled lavatory.…
The claret of the gods
I cannot remember a jollier lunch. There are two brothers, Sebastian and Nicholas Payne, both practical epicureans. They have made…
High life
When I founded the American Conservative 13 years ago — the purpose being to shine a light on the neocon…
Long life
My friend Alan Rusbridger has just given up editing the Guardian after a distinguished 20-year reign that has climaxed, as…
Long life
My friend Alan Rusbridger has just given up editing the Guardian after a distinguished 20-year reign that has climaxed, as…
Low life
Before delivering his sermon, the vicar said we must offer one another the sign of peace. He struck the first…
Low life
Before delivering his sermon, the vicar said we must offer one another the sign of peace. He struck the first…
Speak human
The next Labour leader will have to be able to speak human, said a piece in the Observer. This, it…
Real life
Aren’t the police getting younger nowadays — and ruder, and scruffier and more intolerant of middle-class women? In other words,…
The best way to end the ‘poshness test’
There’s a warning buried in the detail of the new report by the Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission on…
The best way to end the ‘poshness test’
There’s a warning buried in the detail of the new report by the Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission on…
A lightbulb moment at the self-checkout
I spent the last few days in Deal and Folkestone with Professor Richard Thaler at Nudgestock, Ogilvy’s seaside festival of…
Wild life
Laikipia, Kenya Out cross-country running on the farm in Kenya recently, I came face-to-face with a gang of bull…
Putting Greece on a sound footing is like cleaning out the Augean Stables
There’s nothing to add to Martin Vander Weyer’s item about Hellas of two weeks ago in these here pages except…
After the initial shock of my cancer diagnosis, I’ve never been happier
On Sunday morning, I was kicking a football in the back garden with my grandson. I had bought him his…
The joy of anti-psychotic drugs
The doctor eyed me suspiciously as I walked into her consulting room. ‘Ye-es?’ she said, nervously, eyeing me up and…
Dressing up for the opera is not elitist
It’s June, and the country-house summer opera festivals are now in full swing. Glyndebourne, which opened the season last month,…
Frankie Dettori: Britain’s favourite Italian is back
Nothing has been lost since William Powell Frith painted his Derby Day panorama in 1858: today, instead of the carriages…
Bridge
Andrew (Bertie) Black started his bridge life many moons ago but stopped to found Betfair, which became the world’s largest…
Triple tie
This week I conclude my coverage of the Fidé (World Chess Federation) Grand Prix which finished last month in Khanty-Mansiysk.…
