In-line, online, and where to draw the line
Notes on Colombo’s books and bookmen in the time of Covid-19
Hat trick ball
Help me trace Gunner Costello, the fast bowler who may have survived a Court-Martial
The book to read if you’re intent on visiting Sri Lanka
A S H Smyth on Andrew Fidel Fernando’s Upon a Sleepless Isle, winner of the 2019 Gratiaen Prize
The Scullabogue martyrs
A S H Smyth remembers his Quaker ancestors killed June 5, during the Irish rebellion of 1798
Emerging from Sri Lanka’s lockdown: a morning at Colombo’s booksheds
A S H Smyth pays a visit to one of his favourite places in Colombo
My first Carr
A S H Smyth discovers a true English literary eccentric, born on this day in 1912
Strength and honour: looking back on 20 years of Gladiator
Are you not entertained?!
May day, May day…
A letter from Colombo
“Beauty Retire”
Some musical notes on the portrait of Samuel Pepys: revelations from his diary
Of course women support women
Men are angry about where women’s money is going? What’s new?
Liz Truss was right but naive
She grasped the scale of Britain’s plight but misunderstood the nature of power
The true lie of the land
Landowners are reviled as enemies of the environment by the Jacobins of the green movement but these Poundland Robespierres are simply blinded by prejudice
This England
We should celebrate the glorious wartime cinematic masterpiece that Churchill wanted to ban
Playfulness and tedium
Stravinsky, Petrushka; Debussy, Jeux and Prelude (Decca)
The shadowy economics of fentanyl
One professor is investigating how the deadly drug trade works — and how it might be fought
The stench of Chanel No 5
Set mainly in Nazi-occupied Paris, The New Look tells the story of Coco Chanel and Christian Dior
Drying up
How canals retreated into quiet obscurity
A mum’s place is in the Irish constitution
Ireland’s constitution is rare in protecting mothers, so why change this?
Why is the US facing a “crisis of credibility”?
It is a crisis that has been created by the hubris of the establishment
The age of the news influencer
TikTok reveals a broader existential crisis facing the media and our consumption of the news
