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Life under the Taliban’s charm offensive
The Taliban Cultural Commission sounds a contradiction in terms but for all foreign journalists it’s the first stop in the…
Irish quartet: Beautiful World, Where Are You?, by Sally Rooney, reviewed
The millennial generation of Irish novelists lays great store by loving relationships. One of the encomia on the cover of…
How ‘Xi Jinping Thought’ is taking over China’s classrooms
How ‘Xi Jinping Thought’ took over China’s classrooms
Why I don’t stick to football
In football, you are always stronger in numbers. With a shared focus, people from different cultures, nationalities, races, sexual orientations,…
Freedom to protest is not freedom to cause chaos
The concept of normality has been so disrupted over the past 18 months that the Extinction Rebellion protests — usually…
How would Jane Austin have fared at a book festival?
I’ve been to two of my favourite book festivals recently, Chalke Valley History Festival and Charleston, and the experience has…
The neocolonialist legacy of Tony Blair
The Americans may have pulled out, but luckily the Afghans have the world’s vibrant community of witches intervening to save…
China’s #MeToo moment
Can the CCP control China’s harassment scandals?
The Orwell Foundation has let George Orwell down
George Orwell would not have been surprised by the brouhaha surrounding Kate Clanchy. Two years ago, Clanchy published Some Kids…
Even the Taliban are in shock: my week on the Kabul front line
Kabul I’ve been to the front line in Iraq, Syria and Libya and witnessed all kinds of crazy, unlikely…
The flaw at the heart of humanitarian intervention
One of the most interesting aspects of President Biden’s speech on the American withdrawal from Afghanistan is that it shows…
Fascist, anti-Semite and dupe: the dark side of G.K. Chesterton
The Sins of G.K. Chesterton demands our attention because, as Richard Ingrams notes in his introduction, the literature on this…
China is finding out the price of zero Covid’
China’s Covid policy can’t last
Churchill as villain – but is this a character assassination too far?
Revisionist biographies of Churchill are nothing new but this one lays the hostility and contempt on with a trowel, says Andrew Roberts
The death of the Edinburgh Fringe
Lloyd Evans finds the newly returned Edinburgh Fringe quieter, more low-key — and all the better for it
Cuomo, Trump and the secret of eternal political life
There are many in Donald Trump’s inner circle who have tried to read his mind these past four years, together…
Liberté, égalité, vacciné: France’s Covid passport revolt is just beginning
France’s revolt against Covid passports is just beginning
Why shouldn’t we worship the NHS?
For obvious reasons, stocks in ex-editors of The Spectator are experiencing an all-time low. But my own complaint is with…
‘I’m plagued by worries of disaster’: an interview with Dominic Cummings
Dominic Cummings on asteroids, AI and leaving No. 10
Why we shouldn’t fear a ‘fourth wave’ of Covid
Covid is meeting a wall of immunity
An interest in the bizarre helps keep melancholy at bay
Philip Hensher finds Robert Burton’s perception of the world and the human condition endlessly fascinating
Why I gave up writing fiction
When, three years ago, I announced my retirement from writing fiction, the only thing that surprised me was the surprise…
Should Simone Biles listen to Novak Djokovic?
I’ve always been a Spectator reader, so I’m delighted to be writing a diary about the Olympics from Tokyo. My…
My brush with a royal literary crisis
The past week has seen another media splash about the self-exiled Duke and Duchess of Sussex. Following the recent ruckus…
Turning the tide: how to deal with Britain’s new migrant crisis
How Britain can stem the stream of illegal arrivals
