Communism
Humans hunger for the sacred. Why can’t the new atheists understand that?
Atheists are blind to a fundamental human need
Talking to the ghosts of Tiananmen Square
Twenty-five years ago, Rowena Xiaoqing He, then a schoolgirl, was participating in the Tiananmen-supporting demonstrations in Canton. Far from the…
Julian Mitchell on Another Country: ‘I based it on my fury and anger and I wrote it fast and it flowed'
Robert Gore-Langton talks to Julian Mitchell about the painful roots of his hit play Another Country
The many attempts to assassinate Trotsky
Leon Trotsky’s grandson, Esteban Volkov, is a retired chemist in his early eighties. I met him not long ago in…
Secrets of the Kremlin
A building bearing testimony to the power of eternal Russia; a timeless symbol of the Russian state; a monument to…
George Orwell's doublethink
The inventor of ‘doublethink’ was consistently inconsistent in his own political views, says A.N. Wilson. And no fun at all
I was Ralph Miliband's research assistant, and this is what he was like
Memories of being Ralph Miliband’s research assistant
One Night in Winter, by Simon Sebag Montefiore - review
Simon Sebag Montefiore’s One Night in Winter begins in the hours immediately following the solemn victory parade that marked the…
Isaac & Isaiah, by David Caute - review
The scene is the common room of All Souls College, Oxford, in the first week of March 1963. It is…
Roger Scruton’s diary: Finding Scrutopia in the Czech Republic
Hay-making was easy this year, and over in good time for a holiday. I am opposed to holidays, having worked…
