England

The shocking truth about the English and the Scots: they agree

12 December 2015 9:00 am

Last year, the United Kingdom came within 384,000 votes of destruction. A referendum designed to crush the Scottish nationalists instead…

The romanticism of fell and water

Wrestling with the romantic glory of the Lake District

29 October 2015 9:00 am

Cumberland and Westmorland Wrestling is the best thing in the Lake District. I lived near Wigton, just north of the…

Jeremy Corbyn isn’t like Caligula’s horse – he’s like Caligula

26 September 2015 8:00 am

Jeremy Corbyn has been compared to plenty of people over the past few months — a geography teacher, Michael Foot,…

Tristram Hunt’s diary: The rainy glories of Devon – and a cold political climate

5 September 2015 9:00 am

‘Devon, Devon, Devon/ Where it rains six days out of seven.’ Nothing beats a British seaside holiday. And north Devon…

Why nothing in sport beats thrashing the Aussies at cricket

15 August 2015 9:00 am

Why nothing in sport beats thrashing the Aussies at cricket

Prue Leith’s diary: When did weddings stop being for parents?

8 August 2015 9:00 am

My Cambodian daughter and her husband have just got married again. Wedding One was a Buddhist affair in our drawing…

Tides of wealth: Polzeath beach

Would Betjeman recognise anything about today’s north Cornwall?

11 July 2015 9:00 am

In a documentary filmed at the end of his life, Sir John Betjeman, who lived in the village of Trebetherick…

First he brought limp salad, and now it’s drizzling

The pitfalls of picnics (and how to avoid them)

4 July 2015 9:00 am

Strange, isn’t it, that despite having such famously terrible weather, we Brits are so fond of a picnic. It’s something…

Letters: Booming churches, brilliant Swedes and who gets the VC

20 June 2015 9:00 am

Growing congregations Sir: I would like to take issue with Damian Thompson (‘Crisis of faith’, 13 June) and his assertions…

A piece of primeval England reborn in Sussex

30 May 2015 9:00 am

A piece of ancient England is being reborn around a castle in Sussex

Grayson Perry - heir to Lewis Caroll and William Blake

30 May 2015 9:00 am

At the Turner Prize dinner of 2003, as the winner, Grayson Perry, took a photo call with his family wearing…

Anita Dobson as Queen Elizabeth I in ‘Armada: 12 Days to Save England’

BBC2's Armada has something for everybody - including three yummy female historians

30 May 2015 9:00 am

It has been a while since the BBC really pushed the boat out on the epic history documentary front. Perhaps…

Scotland knows the power of a common enemy. We English don’t

18 April 2015 9:00 am

When last Sunday Pope Francis took the brave step of acknowledging the Armenian tragedy as the ‘first genocide of the…

The myth of the housing crisis

28 February 2015 9:00 am

The coalition is letting developers concrete over the countryside, but that won’t help young people buy houses

France, England and the tragedy of DSK

28 February 2015 9:00 am

When we consider poets who perished before their day, thoughts turn to the Romantics or the war victims: Burns, Keats,…

It takes a village (or six): the battle for rural churches

21 February 2015 9:00 am

Can England’s 10,000 rural churches survive?

My grandson's getting into the rugby: 'Which one's West Ham?'

14 February 2015 9:00 am

My grandson and I had a lovely hour-long swim at the leisure centre. We had the learner pool to ourselves…

Beauty and exhilaration: hunting in Norfolk

The sheer joy of hunting

17 January 2015 9:00 am

This time three years ago, I hadn’t jumped a single thing for almost ten years. This season, I am happily…

Bruce Anderson’s diary: If you want to understand the SNP, it helps to be an ex-Trot

3 January 2015 9:00 am

An embarrassing confession: in the late 1960s, I was a Trotskyite. But that period of political adolescence has its uses.…

Return of the fairy-hunters

3 January 2015 9:00 am

An eccentric English tradition has attracted fresh academic attention

‘The plan was to pour the apple juice into an oak hogshead, freshly emptied of its whisky’

The birth of a barrel of cider

6 December 2014 9:00 am

The fabulous October weather is now just a memory but it made for a golden, old-fashioned apple day down in…

Escape from Omnishambleshire: the case for the old county boundaries

25 October 2014 9:00 am

If you want real local identity to thrive in England, put the old county boundaries back on the map

Spectator letters: In defence of the GMC and Ukip members, and how Rachmaninov spelled Rachmaninov

18 October 2014 9:00 am

Nothing to fear Sir: So long as we are not breaking any law, we have nothing to fear from the…

I’ve spent years in war zones. And the most terrifying moment of my life just happened in Norfolk

11 October 2014 9:00 am

I’ve spent years in conflict zones. But the scariest thing that’s happened to me involved two bull terriers on a Norfolk beach

Why everywhere should be more like Essex

11 October 2014 9:00 am

Apart from the Wye Valley, where I grew up, there are only two places in Britain I’d consider living: Kent…