Issue: June 2024
The love that can’t be erased
A recent court case exposed the surrogacy industry’s big lie
When breast isn’t best
A major maternity support group is at war with its trustees over its insistence that men should be enabled to breastfeed
Please remember, terrorism is evil
Worrying numbers of people romanticise the brutality of those perceived as “oppressed”
Iain Banks: a double life
His disturbing debut, The Wasp Factory, is being reissued this year
The odd couple
Evelyn Waugh and Graham Greene may have been unlike as possible, but they remained the closest of friends for four decades
Medical science is oppressive
Illness and wellness are mere taxonomies of power
Rosemary Sutcliff
A writer of genius, capable of conveying the feelings and lives of those who lived in the distant past
Lettuce be, Liz
Liz Truss’s account of her woeful reign is packed with disingenuity and conceit
The first futurist
There is more to Daniel Defoe than Moll Flanders and Robinson Crusoe
Harriet Pester: Bookworld PR
Alas, not everything is plain sailing in the world of book-trade PR
Most Read
American strategy in Iran is wiser than it seems
President Trump’s intervention will leave the world safer than it was
Saint Nicola
Nicola Sturgeon wants sympathy for her husband’s crimes—but after years spent avoiding awkward questions, her latest reinvention may be the hardest sell yet.
The lonely death of Henry Nowak
We must draw lessons from a horrendous and disgraceful case
Rewatching the English
English identity has become too surreal and discomfiting to define
A failed war on fags
The black market has taken over the tobacco trade Down Under
In defence of the Freedom of Information Act
We should not let our access to information held by public authorities be diminished
Where are Britain’s moral voices?
On decriminalising abortion up to birth, the Archbishop of Canterbury must talk the talk, not walk the walk
Making the case for liberalism
Wooldridge’s polemic draws together the disparate traditions of liberal thought and action
When imitation is more then just flattery
An informative and entertaining history of plagiarism in its many forms
How to save a church
Social media stunts, however well intentioned, will not rescue our churches
Form your battalions!
France, for all its flaws, still converts military spending into power — Britain does not
The Reparations Game
Chris and Henry talk to Nigel Biggar about reparations.
On a wind and a prayer
Beggaring ourselves will not cool the rest of the planet’s weather
Vapid slogans for the hard of thinking
Every modern university, it seems, needs a “mission statement”
Who wants to be a patriotic millionaire?
More taxation will not solve our economic woes
Fond portrait of an odd couple
Two irascible, elderly artists and two beautiful younger women in unusual relationships