The good, the bad and the ugly in books, exhibitions, cinema, TV, dance, music, podcasts and theatre.
The answer is Heathrow Airport’s newest terminal, as seen through the eyes of Alain de Botton, who agreed over the summer to become its first writer in residence. It was a brave task to take on; not only could the result have been very dull but de Botton could have felt bound to be nice.
Whether the refusal to allow the Confederate states the right to self-determination, flying as it did in the face of the Declaration of Independence, was the first overt act of American imperialism is a question that goes largely undiscussed. John Keegan does not raise it. For him, unlike World War I, which was ‘cruel and
The origin of this unique publication is the 1990s Waldegrave open government initiative, encouraging departments to reveal more. MI5 began sending its early papers to the National Archive and in 2003 commissioned an outsider to write its history, guaranteeing almost unfettered access to its files. It retained right of veto over the book’s content, but
Richard Nixon had met Henry Kissinger only once before he asked him, on his landslide victory in 1968, to be his National Security Adviser, saying to an aide, ‘I don’t trust Henry but I can use him.’ Richard Nixon had met Henry Kissinger only once before he asked him, on his landslide victory in 1968,
Old detectives rarely die — or age, for that matter: Poirot is forever 60, Sherlock Holmes 50, P. D. James’s Adam Dalgliesh a handsome 38 or so. Old detectives rarely die — or age, for that matter: Poirot is forever 60, Sherlock Holmes 50, P. D. James’s Adam Dalgliesh a handsome 38 or so. But
Twenty years ago, when William Dalrymple published his first book, In Xanadu, travel writers tended to follow the example of Paul Theroux, whose huge success then dominated the genre, and to cast themselves as the heroes of their narratives. ‘With Nine Lives,’ explains Dalrymple in the introduction to his seventh book, ‘I have tried to
‘Recipe for a chic murder,’ runs the blurb on the back of Death Likes it Hot. ‘Recipe for a chic murder,’ runs the blurb on the back of Death Likes it Hot. ‘Take a social-climbing dowager; a house-party full of bright, brittle, amoral idlers; let simmer for a long hot summer weekend, and you get
Just in case you hadn’t guessed after nearly 1,800 pages of the ‘Millennium’ trilogy, the late Stieg Larsson has his alter-ego hero Mikel Blomkvist spell it out. Just in case you hadn’t guessed after nearly 1,800 pages of the ‘Millennium’ trilogy, the late Stieg Larsson has his alter-ego hero Mikel Blomkvist spell it out. ‘This
Time was, back in the Renaissance, when barely a book would be published which did not feature some lavish hero-worship of Cicero. Machiavelli, Erasmus, Thomas More: they all regularly name-checked ‘Tully’. The same could hardly be said of authors today. Even those who do deign to mention Rome’s greatest orator have rarely tended to feel
Following a lively discussion and a member’s poll, the Spectator Book Club’s October book of the month is Bilton, by Andrew Martin. By all accounts it is an extremely funny satire of politics and the media in the late 90s, and it comes highly recommended by a number of Book Club members. You can buy
In 1837 The Quarterly Review’s anonymous critic — actually, one Abraham Hayward — turned his attention to Charles Dickens, then in the first flaring of his popularity as the author of Sketches by Boz, The Pickwick Papers and Oliver Twist. In 1837 The Quarterly Review’s anonymous critic — actually, one Abraham Hayward — turned his
Every schoolboy knows that the two most delightful breeds of dog are the Working Clumber Spaniel and the Newfoundland. Any author who dedicates a book to ‘Wellesley, a New- foundland dog’ is therefore by defin- ition a man of discernment. Sadly, the dedication is the best thing about the book, which is a perfectly readable,
Sometimes you have to pity Literary Editors. Or, to put it another way, one of life’s small pleasures is seeing how newspapers review books written by their own proprietors. I always thought the Telegraph should just have asked Conrad Black to review his own books and like to think that he’d have done it well.
Ronald Blythe writes from his old Suffolk farmhouse, and Susan Hill writes from her old Gloucestershire farmhouse. The view from the windows, the weather, the changing light and the rhythm of the seasons, are evoked by both of them with a similar lyric precision and grace. Reading about their extraordinarily pleasing surroundings and rich interior
The cover of this collection boasts a striking claim by P. D. James: ‘Rumpole, like Jeeves and Sherlock Holmes, is immortal.’ But will Rumpole’s world endure with Baker Street and Totleigh Towers? The cover of this collection boasts a striking claim by P. D. James: ‘Rumpole, like Jeeves and Sherlock Holmes, is immortal.’ But will
The audiotape of Alan Clark’s Diaries — barely mentioned in this rather Dr Watsonish, sensible shoe of a biography — is well worth hearing. The audiotape of Alan Clark’s Diaries — barely mentioned in this rather Dr Watsonish, sensible shoe of a biography — is well worth hearing. Alan Clark narrates them himself, in a
White-haired, red-faced, cheerfully garrulous, outgoing, pugnacious when nec- essary, portly: in his last years Senator Ted Kennedy strikingly resembled the Irish-American politicos of old, particularly his maternal grandfather, John Fitzgerald, ‘Honey Fitz,’ twice mayor of Boston. White-haired, red-faced, cheerfully garrulous, outgoing, pugnacious when nec- essary, portly: in his last years Senator Ted Kennedy strikingly resembled
As a young man in the 1970s Michael Bloch was the architectural historian and diarist James Lees- Milne’s last (if, we are assured, platonic) attachment, and later became his literary executor. As a young man in the 1970s Michael Bloch was the architectural historian and diarist James Lees- Milne’s last (if, we are assured, platonic)
A graphic novel about logic? The idea is not as far-fetched, or as innovative, as one might think. Back in the 1970s, the publishing company Writers and Readers began producing a series of comic books (as they were then called) which sought to provide entertaining and instructive introductions, both to individual philosophers (Marx for Beginners,
In historical writing the Restoration era has been the poor relation of the Puritan one before it. It is true that we all have graphic images, many of them supplied by Samuel Pepys, of the years from the return of the monarchy in 1660: of the rakish court and the mistresses of the merry monarch;
It is entirely possible that nobody, not even perhaps Queen Elizabeth herself, has ever known what she was really like, so great the charm, the smiling gaze, the gloved arm, the almost wistful voice, the lilting politeness, yet so strong the nerve, so dogged the spirit, so determined the trajectory. And so many were the
There was a very good piece by my colleague Martin Ivens in last week’s Sunday Times which asked how the BBC had come to estrange politicians of every party, along with most of the country. Ever willing to help, the BBC provided a partial explanation last week with two decisions of particular stupidity and crassness.
Freemasons have been getting steadily less glamorous since their apotheosis in The Magic Flute. Nowadays, one thinks of them in connection with short-sleeved, polyester shirt-and-tie sets, pens in the top pocket, sock-suspenders and the expression ‘My lady wife’. I honestly can’t see them guarding the secrets of the universe. Dan Brown’s new conspiracy theory cosmic
This is a massive work, 1,132 pages long, not counting the index. This is partly because the author, Professor of the History of the Church, at Oxford, seems anxious to downgrade the importance and uniqueness of Jesus of Nazareth in founding the religion which bears his name, and therefore deals first with the millennium which
Lancaster: The Second World War’s Greatest Bomber, by Leo McKinstry Leo McKinstry’s Lancaster: The Second World War’s Greatest Bomber offers more than is promised by the title. As in his last book, Spitfire: Portrait of a Legend, McKinstry has taken an iconic airplane and, in telling its history, gives not only the technical dimensions of
A Writer’s Britain: Landscape in Literature, by Margaret Drabble This is a book about the inner landscapes of writers, or the ones they inhabited when young, and how these informed their work and affected their readers. In the process of describing these, Margaret Drabble makes lively connections, parallels and distinctions. The languor and melancholy of
The habit of dividing the past into centuries or decades might be historiographically suspect, but by now it seems unavoidable. And it is possible that, because we now expect decades to have flavours of their own, they end up actually having them. We change our behaviour when the year ends in 0. Can there be
Ordinary Thunderstorms is a thriller with grand ambitions. It is set in contemporary London, much of the action taking place on or near the Thames. The timeless, relentless river represents the elemental forces which subvert the sophisticated but essentially temporary structures raised by modern man to showcase his ambition, ingenuity and greed. William Boyd has
Ermyntrude and Esmeralda was written in 1913 but not published until 1969, long after Lytton Strachey’s death. The delay was not surprising: the book consists of an exchange of letters between two naïve 17-year-old girls who are determined to find out where babies come from. Ermyntrude theorises that ‘it’s got something to do with those