Lord Byron
A free spirit: Clairmont, by Lesley McDowell, reviewed
Even by the Villa Diodati’s standards, Claire Clairmont was unconventional, seducing Byron when she was 18, and giving birth to their child after a possible affair with Shelley
A born rebel: Lady Caroline Lamb scandalises society
Antonia Fraser describes an intelligent, independent woman, whose penchant for cross-dressing reflected her yearning for the freedom only men enjoyed
Standing on the Acropolis brings out the Greek in me
Athens I am struggling up the slippery marble steps of the Acropolis with the Geldofs and the Bismarcks. We gaze…
Does a stick insect count as a pet?
What is it that distinguishes humans from other animals? The default answer nowadays is tediously misanthropic, but a more interesting…
Notes on… Lord Byron in Venice
‘I want to see Venice, and the Alps, and Parmesan cheeses.’ So wrote Lord Byron in 1814, some two years…
Was Ada Lovelace the true founder of Silicon Valley?
It’s more than 160 years since the death of the computer pioneer Ada Lovelace, Charles Babbage’s ‘enchantress of numbers’ and…
Fascinating, sexy, improbably compelling and scathingly funny: The Big Short reviewed
The Big Short is a drama about the American financial collapse of 2008. It talks you through sub-prime mortgages, tranches,…
From prince to pauper: a dramatic overview of Britain on 18 June 1815
Of all the big battalions of books marking the bicentenary of the battle of Waterloo that have come my way,…
Patrick Leigh Fermor and the long, daft tradition of Brits trying to save Greece
Twenty-odd years ago, while on holiday in the deep Mani at the foot of the Peloponnese, I got into conversation…
