The bombshell allegations against Thomas Markle
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Who cares if Barclays lays off 5 per cent of its staff?
The gross narcissism of teachers wearing Palestine badges
Fashion has never had a conscience
Who’s who in Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s revolutionary guard
Mail bonding / You can thank The Spectator for the letter box
Child’s play / The perils of baby names
Paris burning / France is a warning – our civilisation is not immortal
Latest from Coffee House
All the latest analysis of the day's news
Class war in the civil service
Is Oxfam discriminating against its white employees?
Why wasn’t Jonathan Powell vetted before starting his security role?
Britain will pay a high price for its doomed EV transition
The Renters’ Rights Act is allowing rent controls to creep in
John Healey has no cash cow to milk
Will Burnham’s war on small irritations pay off?
The madness of moving mummies from museums
Comparing Sally Rooney to Salman Rushdie is beyond risible
Spectator TV Presents
France is heading for revolution – and Marine Le Pen will win | The Edition | with Louis Sarkozy & Loyd Grossman
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Spectator Life
An intelligent mix of culture, food, style and property, plus where to go and what to see.
Fashion has never had a conscience
From Spectator Life
Are we in a global whisky recession?
From the magazine
There is a logic to a tourist tax
From the magazine
What do Uber drivers know about the Toyota Prius?
From the magazine
Two tips for Cheltenham this weekend
From Spectator LifeBritish Champions Day is a natural time to say 'farewell' to another flat season. I am keener to bet on the first major Cheltenham meeting of the jumps season than to back flat horses on soft or heavy ground, not knowing which ones will keep their form at the end of a long campaign. Storm Austen is certain to have a major effect on ground conditions at Cheltenham where the going was described as 'good, good to soft' last night but where the terrain is certain to deteriorate over the coming two days. Local trainer Martin Keighley loves to tackle this late October Cheltenham meeting with his better horses and so they tend to arrive fit enough to do themselves justice.
Oxford has fallen. Blame the traffic filters.
From Spectator Life
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This week's magazine
Revolting France
Revolting France: The riots are driving the country’s politics to its extremes
Paris The wonderful thing about electric bikes, if you are fighting with French riot police, is the way they burn. You skid your Lime or Vélib’ into the middle of the Boulevard de Magenta, which leads from the Gare du Nord down to the Place de la République, and set it alight along with a pile of ordinary bikes, and soon you have a conflagration of rubber and battery chemicals. During the weekend’s street protests, the fires provided cover for rioters breaking into mobile phone, vape and jewellery stores and the money-transfer shops which serve the many immigrants who work in eastern Paris. By Monday morning, a vicious guard dog stood outside an Intermarché supermarket, snarling at customers coming in one by one.
Revolting France: The riots are driving the country’s politics to its extremes
Paris The wonderful thing about electric bikes, if you are fighting with French riot police, is the way they burn. You skid your Lime or Vélib’ into the middle of the Boulevard de Magenta, which leads from the Gare du Nord down to the Place de la République, and set it alight along with a pile of ordinary bikes, and soon you have a conflagration of rubber and battery chemicals. During the weekend’s street protests, the fires provided cover for rioters breaking into mobile phone, vape and jewellery stores and the money-transfer shops which serve the many immigrants who work in eastern Paris. By Monday morning, a vicious guard dog stood outside an Intermarché supermarket, snarling at customers coming in one by one.
Culture
The good, the bad and the ugly in books, exhibitions, cinema, TV, dance, music, podcasts and theatre.
Don’t miss this Cherry Orchard
From the magazineWhere are we? That’s the question raised by Ian Rickson’s version of The Cherry Orchard adapted by Conor McPherson. The setting appears to be a capitalist Russian society that never existed. The young characters wear casual 1950s gear – T-shirts, wristwatches and sunglasses – but the older men can recall a time before the emancipation of the serfs in 1861. Slightly confusing. Has the revolution happened or not? It might be simpler to set the play in 1903 when it was written. The high-status characters use posh Home Counties accents while the servants and hangers-on seem to hail from Scotland, Ireland and Germany. That chaotic set-up works better than it might. The show never fully coheres and it almost feels like three separate plays.
Nureyev was a lousy choreographer
From the magazineA new BBC series that captures some of the channel’s old values
From the magazine
The problem with the Beatles
From the magazine
Ali G isn’t satire
From the magazine
Opera’s obsession with the Eastern bloc
From the magazine
The RA’s triumphant new exhibition
From the magazine
Cartoons
‘‘Luckily I was too busy defending cryptobillionaires to be racist or sexist.’’
Cartoon
‘‘Remind me, what did we come to see?’’
Cartoon
‘The judge felt compelled to direct the jury again.’
Cartoon
