It is over 90 years since D.H. Lawrence wrote Lady Chatterley’s Lover, and 60 since it unleashed our grandparents’ libidos. Now, apparently, the rest of us need to watch it for the same treatment. This at least is the tacit …
The Ukrainian priests fighting for Putin
How many of Ukraine’s priests are working for Putin? The nation’s security services are determined to find out. Last month, the SBU raided a 1,000-year-old Orthodox Christian monastery in Kyiv looking for Russian citizens, cash, and pro-Russian literature. Priests at …
The paradox of Degrowth Communism
One might think that the arrival of the planet’s eight-billionth resident — a title symbolically awarded to Vinice Mabansag, a baby girl born in the Philippines — would be cause for celebration. Amid a sharp drop in the global fertility …
What Hong Kongers fear in Britain
We are being watched. We may be 6,000 miles from the Pearl River Delta, but that does not stop the long arm of the Chinese state reaching into this sports hall in a small town in South Gloucestershire.
I am …
How manifesting was corrupted
Mindlessly scrolling through football transfer rumours on Twitter recently, I noticed some Liverpool fans trying something a little different. The club’s owners weren’t doing the business they wanted, so it was time, one fan suggested, to gather their mental forces …
Has East Germany given up on the West?
When I started working at Berliner Zeitung two years ago, the staff were putting together a dossier on the East-German experience to commemorate the 30th anniversary of reunification. It seemed like the natural thing to do: the newspaper had been …
The rise of Archaeologists Anonymous
In a quiet group chat in an obscure part of the internet, a small number of anonymous accounts are swapping references from academic publications and feverishly poring over complex graphs of DNA analysis. These are not your average trolls, but …
Starmer’s ruthless attack on the Left
For Lauren Townsend, becoming an MP was an obvious choice. Born in Milton Keynes to a working-class family, she has lived in the city all her life, working in a variety of jobs, including as a waitress for TGI Friday …
Why is fashion selling children?
It’s always difficult to decide what to buy the toddler in your life for Christmas. A handbag shaped like a teddy dressed in BDSM gear, perhaps? Or a dog collar and lead? In a new ad campaign for the fashion …
The hidden desire of Tennessee Williams
Loss, a part of life, is certainly a part of literature, but it is seldom its motive force. Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard is not a drama of loss, but of wistfulness. Madame Ranevsky seems to mourn the imminent loss of …
Tofu won’t save the planet
Planning the Christmas lunch yet? If you are vegan you’ve doubtless got tofu in there somewhere, perhaps served up with a sauce made piquant with a tablespoon of smugness. After all, going “plant-based” will save the planet from climate change, …
How we appeased China’s Zero-Covid regime
In the streets of China, people are rising up to reassert their human dignity in the face of the most dehumanising machine of social control in the world today: the Chinese Communist Party’s Zero-Covid terror-state.
For three years, the Chinese …
Museums have always been problematic
In 1906, the New York Times reported on a new exhibition at the monkey house in the Bronx zoo causing a stir among visitors and the press: a human inhabitant. Ota Benga, a 23-year-old Bushman, could be seen in the …
Secularisation is leading Britain astray
In the middle of the night, I am often haunted by the thought of weeds and mould breaking through the parquet floor, of the roof falling in, or the space being populated by pigeons not parishioners. The creeping damp is …
Biden can win on immigration
Inflation, crime, and immigration were the three big issues that were supposed to power a Republican “red wave” in the midterms. That didn’t happen, but these problems remain as real and as urgent as ever. Should they remain unresolved, they …