The Spectator: 15 December 2012
Doctor in distress
The passing of Jonathan Miller’s father Emanuel Miller — a very distinguished psychiatrist — was terrible. ‘His last words, as he reared up on his deathbed, were: “I’m a flop!… Read more
A bloody waste
The US invasion of Iraq in 2003 was an act of frivolity without parallel in United States history. The destruction of the Baathist state caused Iraqis to flee into their… Read more
Of knowledge, life, good and evil
The British Museum contains more about trees than one might expect: trees in paintings, drawings, sculpture, and all kinds of small artefacts of wood and bark. Frances Carey, sometime Deputy… Read more
Old King Noël
What is this I hold in my hands? Is it just a book? It’s quite heavy, but somehow, instinctively, one feels its light heart. When I eventually prize its even… Read more
Return of the living dead
What is it with dead American writers? Years after they’ve popped their clogs, some of the biggest names in crime fiction continue to produce novels from beyond the grave. Mario… Read more
As dark and heavy as plum pudding
Dressed up as a child-friendly, pocket-sized hardback, just the right size for a Christmas stocking and with a pretty front-cover illustration of two dear little children in a snowy fir… Read more
Bleak beauty
Adam Gopnik’s dazzlingly knowledgeable and beautifully told essays on winter began life as the Massey Lecture Series on Canadian National Radio, the Canadian Reith lectures. But dismiss from your mind… Read more
Into the limelight
The online accessibility of British population censuses has resulted in an outpouring of ‘who and how we were’, keeping amateur genealogists, local historians and social commentators extremely busy. Barry Anthony’s… Read more
Men’s Wear
From the Woolrich Elite Concealed Carry line Shawn Thompson bought two shirts. He wrote on his blog: ‘The clothes I used in the past to hide my sidearm looked pretty… Read more
Spot the book title
Test your lateral thinking with our book titles picture puzzle. Answers at the end of ‘Those who can, teach’.
The most decorative honey pot in Ireland
Luggala Lodge was built in Ireland’s Wicklow mountains near the end of the 18th century by Peter La Touche, the son of a French Huguenot banking family. It was only… Read more
Not just for Christmas
New York is a strange place for dogs. As I walked back from an early morning art-world breakfast — black coffee and untouched fruit, untouched granola — the apartment buildings… Read more
In the cold light of dawn
In The English Cathedral Peter Marlow of Royal Mail fame (his photographs of eight world heritage sites were used on stamps in 2005 and in 2008 of six British cathedrals)… Read more
First pluck your crow
As fewer people write by hand, some of us who do venture to squeak a thin call of alarm, like mice behind the frescoes during the last days of Pompeii.… Read more
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