The idea for a mechanical cock was never going to work. In 1595 the English ambassador to Constantinople, Edward Barton, advised Queen Elizabeth I that the surest way for her to impress Sultan Mehmed III, the new leader of the formidable Ottoman empire, was to send him a ‘clock in the form of a cock’.
Robert Mapplethorpe made his reputation as a photographer in the period between the 1969 gay-bashing raid at the Stonewall Inn on Christopher Street and the identification of HIV in 1983. This was the High Renaissance, the Age of Discovery, the Bourbon Louis Romp, the Victorian imperial pomp, the Jazz Age, the Camelot moonshot, the Swinging
Sajid Javid is the driest and most Thatcherite member of the government. So, it is no surprise that he is — rightly, to my mind — rejecting calls for the nationalisation of the steel industry following Tata’s announcement that it plans to sell its UK steel-making business. But the steel issue has now got caught
A fortnight ago, the energy minister, Andrea Leadsom, declared grandly that Britain, alone in the world, would commit to a target of reducing net carbon emissions to zero. ‘The question is not whether but how we do it,’ she told Parliament. It is now becoming painfully clear how this target will be reached: not by
When Sir Gus O’Donnell was head of the civil service, those who worked under him would have prided themselves in the code that he was supposed to uphold: to be impartial, avoid politics and do their best to make sure the public is not misled. This morning, Sir Gus was involved in what can only be
You might expect that the murder of Christians would excite particular horror in countries of Christian heritage. Yet almost the opposite seems to be true. Even amid the current slew of Islamist barbarities, the killing of 72 people, 29 of them children, on Easter Day in Lahore, stands out. So does the assault in Yemen
The news for landlords seems to keep getting worse. Following a clampdown on tax relief and a huge hike in stamp duty on rental properties, the Bank of England announced yesterday that lenders will soon be forced to introduce substantially tougher borrowing standards when it comes to buy-to-let mortgages. The Bank’s Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) revealed that
A crackdown on the buy-to-let market makes it to the front page of a number of this morning’s newspapers following recommendations published by the Bank of England yesterday. The Bank announced criteria that will make it tougher to secure a loan on a buy-to-let property, including forcing all applicants to pass an affordability test based on
On Maundy Thursday a Muslim shopkeeper in Glasgow was brutally murdered. Forty-year-old Asad Shah was allegedly stabbed in the head with a kitchen knife and then stamped upon. Most of the UK press began by going big on this story and referring to it as an act of ‘religious hatred’, comfortably leaving readers with the
On Maundy Thursday a Muslim shopkeeper in Glasgow was brutally murdered. Forty-year-old Asad Shah was allegedly stabbed in the head with a kitchen knife and then stamped upon. Most of the UK press began by going big on this story and referring to it as an act of ‘religious hatred’, comfortably leaving readers with the distinct feeling
Rights compete for privileged status in a liberal society. The right to redefine one’s gender, for instance, conflicts with a woman’s right to undress in a room reserved strictly for women. The right to speak one’s mind on campus comes up against the right of students to live free from unwelcome opinions. And the right
The RSPCA have been in a fair pickle for a while now. It had been without a CEO for two years – after their last one, Gavin Grant, stepped down citing health reasons – until two weeks ago when they announced that Jeremy Cooper, (formerly chief executive of the charity’s ethical food label) would be
When I was 18, I had my first tutorial on Anglo-Saxon history. I cannot remember the details but the don talked of the king of Mercia, or some such, marrying his daughter to the son of the king of Northumbria, or somewhere or other, because of the political advantages the union would bring the two
It takes an achingly long time for the British to see a lickspittle of mass murderers for what he is. For years, you jump up and down shouting ‘look at what he’s done!’ All but a handful ignore you. But he’s a character, the rest cry. He’s not like those poll-driven, focus-group–tested on-message politicians, who speak
When the government implemented radical new pension freedoms a year ago, it was the most fundamental reform to the system in almost a century. And, like so many eye-catching changes, it was given a political spin. ‘Freedom and choice in pensions’ was how it became known. Sounds good, doesn’t it? It’s hard to argue with
A number of British passengers are believed to be amongst those being held hostage on a hijacked EgyptAir plane which has landed in Cyprus. The jet – which took off from Alexandra in Egypt and had been due to fly to Cairo – had 81 passengers on board. Most of those, including 51 Egyptians have
If the thought of work after the long Easter weekend fills you with dread, look away now. A new study suggests that one in five people think they will be working after the age of 70. Willis Towers Watson, a global financial services firm, found that people under the age of 40 were more likely to think
Zac Goldsmith’s mayoral campaign hit a bum note this month when his attempts to reach out to the Indian community backfired. The Conservative MP found himself accused of ‘racially profiling’ voters who have Indian sounding names with patronising leaflets. Happily he appears to have a different plan in place when it comes to winning over the
Which is worse – to take an expensive wine to a party (“Oh, how sweet of you!”) only for the host to snaffle it away, or to take a lousy one (“Oh, um, thanks….”), and be publicly humiliated as it is placed next to the cooking sherry? Of course, in our parents’ day it was
Imagine if correspondents in late 1944 had reported the Battle of the Bulge, but without explaining that it was a turning point in the second world war. Or what if finance reporters had told the story of the AIG meltdown in 2008 without adding that it raised questions about derivatives and sub-prime mortgages that could
