The faces above and below stairs
Soutine’s hotel workers and Cézanne’s gardener feature in two London exhibitions of portraits
Politics, Ideas and the Arts
Indiana Jones and the Table of Babel
An ancient Mesopotamian tablet shows Babylonian trigonometrists had long anticipated the Greeks
Vive les Huguenots!
In Provence, a community of French Protestants gather every September
Liberty ship
Nelson's flagship at Trafalgar, HMS Victory, has earned the right to go back into the water
Critical mass
Theatre critics are frequently out of step with audiences and prone to bringing too much of their own baggage to their writing
Case closed
Ideally, a person should occupy the space of a person. This should rule out the trailing of collision-prone wheeled suitcases
Cornish master class in the art of the sublime
How an inspiring Hungarian violinist created a musical community at IMS Prussia Cove
Witty and readable — but mind the gaps
The second instalment of Simon Schama's history of the Jewish people is typically energetic but has some serious failings
Dead horse, the flogging of
A collection of Martin Amis's essays caresses the bottom of the barrel
Into the vortex of Widmerpool
"Everyone has their Widmerpool . . . Who is your Widmerpool? — awesomely, whose Widmerpool are you?"
Liberalism’s identity crisis
The American Left has taken refuge in an intellectual dead end, argues Mark Lilla
Only connect
Niall Ferguson's big theory of history is stimulating, arresting, but only half-convincing