An intelligent mix of culture, style, travel, food and property, as well as where to go and what to see.
The German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860) once wrote that “the man who feels himself drawn to philosophy must himself seek out its immortal teachers in the quiet sanctuary of their works.” That’s easier said than done: philosophical classics have a terrible reputation outside ivory towers – as big, boring, difficult books, filled with obtuse theorizing about irrelevant problems, their covers featuring ghastly
I almost spat out my toast (smothered with the As Ever, The Raspberry Spread Trio – “Made To Keep On Hand And Enjoy Often,” $42 – naturally) in pure molten anticipation when I read that my role model in spreading jam to flour, sorry, speaking truth to power, will be hosting a women-only weekend “retreat” in Sydney during her forthcoming
This St. David’s Day weekend, I devote this column to a celebration of the world’s most under-appreciated ethnic group. Under-appreciated, certainly, in the pages of The Spectator, whose editorial policy suffers from a Pictish delusion that its readers are eager to hear of the appointment of a new procurator fiscal in Ayrshire, or political divides
It was the sort of elaborate birthday surprise that Andrew – practical joker and fond of a fart gag – might have arranged to prank a friend. Six unmarked police cars roaring up to the farmhouse where he had been living on the Sandringham estate at the unseemly hour of 8 a.m yesterday. Only these
In recent months, much has been made of “FAFO parenting.” Touted as the backlash to “gentle parenting,” the philosophy of “Fuck Around & Find Out” seems to be that children should learn the natural consequences of poor decision-making. While gentle parenting advocates empathy and respect, reasoning and explanation, FAFO parenting dictates that rather than going nine rounds with your small person to
Did Mariah Carey mime or not when she headlined the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympics in Milan? That was the main takeaway from last month’s jamboree. Organizers have since suggested that the US singer did indeed lip-sync to Domenico Modugno’s “Nel Blu, dipinto di Blu” and the song that followed, her very own, “Nothing is Impossible.” “The technical, logistical and organizational complexities of an Olympic ceremony
I’ve been fat and I’ve been thin; I’ve been pretty and I’ve been plain – ugly, even. Throughout this, my self-esteem has stayed generally constant, as if you’re going to base it on something as ephemeral as physical beauty, you’re going to run out of road very quickly indeed. This objective attitude to my own
To walk out of a public performance before the end – be it the theater, a concert or a lecture – is not the done thing. It’s considered an antisocial act that disrupts the performance and thus other people’s pleasure. To walk out provokes tuts of disapproval and scowls of indignation. And yet while it’s
I can remember when I first realized that something strange was happening to white men in Hollywood. It was around 2014, and my younger colleagues in LA – often British writers, directors and actors who had moved to California to “make it” – began reporting, anecdotally, that their work was disappearing. By that I don’t
The past few weeks has seen the pleasing spectacle of beautiful female film stars (Sydney Sweeney, Keira Knightley – even the previous Trump Derangement Syndrome sufferer Jennifer Lawrence, who once said that an orange victory would be “the end of the world”) refusing to toe the accepted Hollywood line on politics, be it by not kowtowing
A new drinks-party-shirking method has taken hold in society. I call it “Lastminute.non.” Previously, the way of not going to someone’s party was to write a polite message of refusal at least a week in advance, giving the host or hostess ample time to absorb the sad but inevitable fact that various friends would not
Welcome to the People’s Republic of Santa Monica
The good news about these execrable awards shows is that they tend to expose who these people are in real life
It’s almost beyond belief that the state used to be a glorious paradise of tennis-playing, churchgoing, hard-working patriotic Republicans
There is no greater tabula rasa in the public imagination than grief. Prince Philip’s four children – no strangers to the glare of public interest – now find themselves the target not of global ire, but rather unusually, of collective sympathy. For public figures, the warm light of communal compassion imbues recognition and significance on the lives
In January, Channel 4’s Cathy Newman interviewed the Canadian academic Jordan Peterson. The channel broadcast a short version of the interview on the evening news bulletin, where it would have been seen by the few hundred thousand people who watch the programme nightly. But to its credit, Channel 4 also published online the full half-hour
