Life
Aussie life
Are conservative journalists more endangered than polar bears? Unlike the habitat of the world’s largest land carnivore, the landscape across…
(Pro-) Aussie life
‘We are not changing any of the settings and I don’t believe we need to change any of the settings’…
Spectator competition winners: The last will and testament of Gollum
In Competition No. 3248, you were asked to submit the last will and testament of a fictional character. In a…
No. 702
White to play. Averbakh-Zita, Szczawno-Zdroj 1950. Black has just interposed Rb6-g6, so White needs an accurate finish before e3-e2 mate…
Solution to 2552: 😀
The emoticon which formed the title of the puzzle suggested George Smiley, Le Carré’s nemesis of MI6 moles, ordered as…
2555: 6 x 2 mixtures
The unclued lights (one of two words) can be resolved into six pairs, in some way related. Ignore one acute…
Remembering Averbakh
Yuri Averbakh had a wry explanation for why he was made chairman of the USSR Chess Federation in 1972. There…
How not to understand the Brexit referendum
Simon Kuper’s Chums: How a Tiny Caste of Oxford Tories Took Over the UK is a wonderful compendium of anecdotes…
The horror of gluten-free beer
I was reminded of the worst liquid that I have ever consumed. It was the last occasion on which I…
Dear Mary: How do we stop friends dropping by without calling?
Q. Some years ago, much to the surprise of our many friends in London, my husband and I moved to…
In the footsteps of Hemingway
‘They were living at le Grau du Roi then and the hotel was on a canal that ran from the…
Why disgraced MPs head for the Chiltern Hundreds
I saw in last week’s Spectatorthat the tractor MP had applied for the stewardship of the Manor of Northstead. After…
Are iPhones sending women gaga?
The girl wound down her window, stuck her mobile phone out into midair, and started to take pictures of the…
My solution to unfair traffic fines
My driveway now lies in the middle of an ‘Average Speed Check Zone’. It’s a wonderful arrangement – for me…
Is Klaus Schwab the greatest threat of our time?
New York Alexandra rang me from London to enquire about a man by the name of Klaus Schwab: ‘He sounds…
The Battle for Britain | 14 May 2022
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The art of picking winners
‘Some of our players can hardly write their names,’ moaned one leading football manager. ‘But you should see them add…
Bridge | 14 May 2022
The Spring Fours is one of the great events in the English bridge calendar – a five-day knockout attracting many…
Eccles cakes
When I first made Eccles cakes, I’m not sure I really knew where Eccles was. I certainly didn’t think I’d…
Aussie life
In The Australian Ugliness, published in 1960, the architect Robin Boyd remembered a meal in a hotel dining room in…
Language
Now a new and (I think) much needed expression: ‘disagreement consent’. It’s a play on a more familiar expression I…
The sin of neutrality
Yet again, millions of civilians across the Horn of Africa are starving. The world blames the crisis on drought and…
2551: Madness - solution
The four-letter word was BAND. Unclued lights suggest bandicoot (7A),bandh (11), banda (41), bandana (1D), bandoneon (3), bandook (7D), bandar…
The rise and rise of women’s sport
You might have missed this but something very big is happening in women’s sport. The sheer numbers watching are sensational:…
Are we living in a new pornocracy?
Are we living in a new pornocracy? The first one spanned six decades of the 10th century, during which there…
