Foreign frivolity
Robert Thicknesse on how the idea that foreign poetry was better than local soon became established dogma
Losing the plot
Robert Thicknesse reveals how in searching for meaning, opera adaptations are becoming more obscure
Moving beyond the text
La Clemenza di Tito, Geneva
Shock of the new
People are terrified of modernity’s great gift: the sudden freedom to make appalling noise, says Robert Thicknesse
Cheer leaders
Opera unswervingly believes in the potential for a divine spark in humans, says Robert Thicknesse
Do not go gently
Opera has treated the subject of cancelling the pleasures of others in some depth
How about some vistas of beauty?
Covent Garden’s first post-lockdown offering is in a long, grim tradition
Sex tips from Semele
Opera was the tinder of Renaissance Venice, says Robert Thicknesse
A grim chorus of philistines
Rishi’s £1.57 Billion handout to the arts sector is the last good news it’ll ever hear, says Robert Thicknesse
To the streets, via the Crush Bar
Robert Thicknesse on Opera
Sports inequity
Modern academia wants us to believe six impossible things before breakfast
An excess of Fauré
Gabriel Fauré: Violin concerto (Naxos), Complete piano works (Calliope)
Don’t exploit Gisèle Pelicot’s story
Her legal triumph should be the start and not the end of the reckoning
November Letters
Aiming for the rescue and rebuilding of liberal capitalism
The coming of age
On the anxieties and ambiguities of adulthood
October letters
Misquoting Shakespeare and a rounded sense of humour
Food for thoughtlessness
The march of the public health puritans continues
She wants to be in America
🎶 Airtime for me in America 🎶
Cometh the hour, cometh the dealmaker
Trump’s ego might be just what the world needs
Donald Trump should not heed the call of foreign policy hawks
The world is not split neatly between good guys and bad guys
Farewell, knights errant of the road
Once one of London’s most distinctive tribes, cycle messengers are a dying breed
