I met someone on the bus who I know from my church. I was glad to see her, meeting people in the street and chatting is so different from my former life in London. Unfortunately, some of these conversations are all too predictable. ‘I’ve just been to the memorial gathering for Hiroshima,’ she breathed, barely audible with self-righteous satisfaction as … [Read on]

About a year ago, I shared a train compartment with a seemingly reticent Canadian fellow, a man heavily shielded by a newspaper, and I doubted I’d catch a syllable from the stolid moose. But after gobbling a handsome steak sandwich with yellow dressing and downing a pint, he eased into a happier frame of mind. And after another pint, and … [Read on]

Book Review. Dangerous Hero, Tom Bower, William Collins, 2018, £20. Before 2015, the most high profile figure to have had his retirement plans ruined by a leadership election in a political party was Denis Thatcher when his wife’s ambitions dragged him from the golf course for a decade as a political consort. Among the many ironies Tom Bower reveals about … [Read on]

Three years after the June 2016 there are still people beholden to the Brussels gravy train for personal, financial, and (perhaps) ideological reasons. They’re still sabotaging Brexit. Their slurs, smears, and lies still have Britain trussed up in Lilliputian red tape and tied to the eurovillage. For a good slice of the last three years the voice of Tony Blair … [Read on]

Every year the BBC extravagantly boasts that its Promenade Concerts are “the world’s greatest series of concerts of classical music.” Well, let’s see… This is how they bill tonight’s offering: “The BBC Proms takes over the newly refurbished Battersea Arts Centre for a showcase of provocative, witty and boundary-crossing composer-performers, who have been driving new music in previously unimagined directions.” … [Read on]

The last thing I thought would result from my cancer diagnosis was a begging letter from the Institute of Cancer Research. It informed me that my details were obtained from a business called The Museums Collection, from which I had over the years made various small purchases. That was the second such link to the Museums Collection within a week. … [Read on]

A friend of mine is in trouble after naïvely writing a piece for Oxford’s Merton College magazine containing the words: ‘Mertonians attended the college Gaudy, reviving the strong camaraderie and easy-going friendships we experienced in the long-ago days when Merton was still a men’s college.’ He was immediately reported for using ‘offensive language.’ The college warned him that,  ‘Those words … [Read on]