Signs, Not Wonders
A retrospective of Damien Hirst’s work shows his skill as an aesthetic showman—but not as an artist
Politics, Ideas and the Arts
The Subject We’re Desperate to Avoid
Despite two shocking stories, the abortion debate has faded again
Lucian Freud and Tracey Emin
According to the great 19th-century draughtsman Jean-Auguste Ingres, "Drawing is the probity of art." This aphorism has been put to the test recently by the noise surrounding the graphic work of Lucian
The Flowers Plucked Too Soon
The mystique surrounding those chess players who passed before their primes is best tipified in the mercurial Hungarian, Rudolf Charousek
A Voice of Pure Gold
Kathleen Ferrier's wonderful career was cut short by her death at 41 in 1953. Thankfully plenty of the contralto's songs were committed to vinyl
Time to Crunch the Numbers
'With only a couple of hundred fewer delegates than Romney, Santorum believes there's everything still to play for—especially in a race that has already had eight frontrunners'
Beware the Fausts of Neuroscience
Neuroscientists attempt to reduce the greatest aspects of human behaviour and existence to material Darwinism. We should be sceptical about their overblown claims
We’re Good Europeans Yet They All Hate Us
In 1953 Thomas Mann called “not for a German Europe, but a European Germany”. Now we have both—and neither is happy
Obama’s Timidity Risks the World’s Security
The President has eviscerated the US defence budget, and so threatens to deprive America of the means to use decisive force
How the Left Turned Against the Jews
Anti-Semitism has never been confined to the Right. Its latest manifestation is the left-wing campaign to undermine Israel
Universities Must Be Freed from Meddling
Britain’s seats of learning are coping with the new funding regime but are threatened by philistine regulators
Forget Wind: Time for Britain to Get Fracking
Blinded by climate change dogma, the government seems determined to play down the Lancashire shale gas bonanza