Those visiting Romania for the first time will often be told that its association with vampires is really an unfair imposition, having mostly to do with Bram Stoker’s invention of a Transylvanian setting for his 1897 novel, Dracula. His tale, …
A very British Hajj
A verdigris statue of Queen Victoria, palming an orb, stands watch at the top of Hill Street, Windsor. On the morning of the funeral her hollow metal eyes blankly stare down the road. The sky is a rolling surf grey.…
The myth of lockdown socialism
After taking the summer off, the lockdown wars are back. Last week, enthusiasts for Covid restrictions attributed the Queen’s death at the age of 96 to the after-effects of Covid, rather than old age, and argued that this showed the …
The British police need guns
The public unsurprisingly jumped to conclusions when it was reported, earlier this month, that a Metropolitan Police officer had fatally shot an apparently unarmed black man. Voices from the black community and beyond have speculated that the shooting was either …
Corruption plagues the Dutch gas wars
Nestled in the green countryside far from the power and bustle of The Hague sits a bright, pink farmhouse. This 157-year-old Grade-A-listed building in Drieborg is not allowed to be Barbie pink. Painting it was a protest, a sign that …
The Queen shows the democracy of death
Edward VII was the first monarch to lie in state in Westminster Hall. Half a million people queued up to see the King over those three days in May 1910, many of them in the rain. Our late Queen will …
Charles will be our Perennialist King
King Charles III has often been accused of heresy. As the Prince of Wales, his early support of environmental activism and his (tenuous) involvement in the World Economic Forum’s Great Reset marked him out as a dissenter who might break …
The coronation of Ron DeSantis
Late last week, 50 Venezuelan migrants arrived by plane in Martha’s Vineyard, the summer getaway for America’s rich and powerful. Their presence on the island — a liberal haven that has been untouched by the ongoing border crisis — was …
Can the nation survive Elizabeth?
I was camping by a lake when I heard the news. My son and I were off fishing and hiking in Connemara in the Irish west, hunting down pollock and wrasse and trout, and plunging into bogs on the slopes …
How the Queen weakened monarchy
It is an odd time for my profession. Everyone thinks historians should comment on the death of Queen Elizabeth II. But, at the same time, we are expected to come out with nothing but sententious platitudes. Hearing Sir Simon Schama …
How the Queen weakened monarchy
It is an odd time for my profession. Everyone thinks historians should comment on the death of Queen Elizabeth II. But, at the same time, we are expected to come out with nothing but sententious platitudes. Hearing Sir Simon Schama …
Has Liz Truss trapped Labour?
At the heart of Downing Street is “The Grid” — the confidential calendar of media announcements that drives the daily drumbeat of government stories. Departments always compete to have one of their policies slotted in as “Story Of The Day”; …
The American media’s racism fantasy
It was the kind of correction you love to see. The story that originally broke in the final days of August, about a young black athlete being racially heckled in front of a crowd of thousands at Utah’s Brigham Young …
South Korea is stealing from the West
Lee Jung-jae is in many ways the epitome of South Korean soft power. He has won international fame — and an Emmy this week — with his starring role in the hit Netflix series Squid Game, the dystopian South Korean …
Scotland’s Tavistock must fall
Sinéad Watson didn’t mean to become an activist for vulnerable women. At the age of 20, she began to identify as a man, binding her breasts and using the name Sean. But at 27, after four-and-a-half years on testosterone, she …