All boys together in Pinterworld
A new production of Betrayal reminds us of the playwright’s insights into male relationships
Politics, Ideas and the Arts
Cold comfort for farmers
A full Brexit would give the UK an opportunity to re-set our relationship with the land and the seas — if the current impasse is resolved so that we are no longer
Describing the indescribable
Very few of our greatest writers have managed to capture the emotional essence of music
Empire loyalist
John Buchan’s labours not only served the public good: they provided the raw material and characters for his thrillers
Deep waters
David Laws demolishes a conspiracy theory about the death of Lord Kitchener and does it very classily indeed
Artificial love in the age of AI
McEwan and the machine
Bear with a sore head
"Keir Giles suggests what the West’s policy towards Moscow should look like if it is to be guided by reality rather than hopes or a pretty dream"
Bloody liberties
"Amazon’s puff for On Freedom says that Sunstein takes a “pathbreaking” approach to the subject. In fact, confounding ability with freedom is an old mistake"
Boom time for Picasso Inc.
One name dominates the art market, with his paintings soaring in value and remaining a solid investment
Rulers ruled by a sense of history
"Christopher Clark's subject is neither time nor power, but something even more evanescent: how those who wielded power were influenced by their sense of history"
Still waiting in the wings
The Fourth Reich concerns of the first 15 years or so after the war were essentially rational, but in the 1960s the term became “universalised”, exaggerated, and distorted
The man who went off script
In her lively and readable biography, Adina Hoffman charts Ben Hecht’s progress from America’s most successful screenwriter to Jewish activist