Warhol’s obscene legacy
As everyone who stands up when a lady enters the room knows, the once sacrosanct rules of civility throughout the…
Lament for a lost Venice
I’m in Venice for the film festival that just ended and, as an American humorist once wired his paper: ‘Streets…
The curse of Saudi money
After the heat in Greece, the Alps are cool and green and very comfortable. My sensei Richard Amos is over…
My final word on Diana
I was appalled. She had asked Lord John Somerset to ask me to join her, and I rose rather unsteadily…
Lenin’s New Man has killed free speech
When the Germans smuggled arguably the world’s most evil man into Russia 100 years ago, they did not imagine the…
I need this latest birthday like a hole in my head
As Jacob Rees-Mogg said in a different context, a happy birthday at my age is a terminological inexactitude. I needed…
You are what those who work for you think of you
Greece is jasmine, bougainvillea, mimosa, cypress, olive, pine, oregano and sage, rock, sand, wine, fruit and the bluest and cleanest…
Democracy is dead
I’ve stayed far away from the new barbarians with their choppers, tank-like cars, home theatres on board, and fridge-shaped super…
A party with the last hurrah of Athenian society
Greece I am surfing along the Cycladic islands on Puritan, a 125ft classic that was launched in 1929 by…
I switch personalities depending on which Spectator party it is
I switch personalities at Spectator parties, depending who the guests are: for our readers’ tea party, I am a warm…
In praise of the fuzz
I was going through my paces in Hyde Park, sweating out the booze, raising the heartbeat with short wind sprints,…
The Queen, Camilla and me
A funny thing happened on my way to lunch last week. I opened the Daily Mail and read a few…
Donald Trump’s Qatari masterstroke
A major Greek ship owner, whose political knowledge matches his wealth and business acumen, explained to me what the Qatar…
Where’s Ayn Rand when you need her?
A famous epigrammatic nugget of wisdom appears in The Leopard, Lampedusa’s great novel about a noble Sicilian family’s fortunes: ‘If…
Thank God for the DUP
I was busy explaining to a 23-year-old American girl by the name of Jennifer why the election result was not…
It’s my final week in the Bagel — and I’m giving it my all
New York Main Street is a place, but it’s mostly an idea. It’s where locally owned shops sell stuff…
Why I’ve had it with Donald Trump
I feel like an obituary writer, what with Nick Scott, Roger Moore, Alistair Horne — all great buddies — and…
My dinner with CIA spooks
New York Although both guilt and innocence fascinate me, I’m not so sure that there is such a thing as…
Journalists have a lot to answer for
At a chic dinner party last week, a Trump insider gossiped about an American president having had an affair with…
Anna Wintour’s freak show diminishes a great institution
Much like the poor, the charity ball has always been with us, but lately it’s turned into a freak. Something…
Remembering Nick Scott: artist and clubman par excellence
I’m sitting in my office and the place is still. The rest of the house is dark. Everyone’s out and…
Tales from the heyday of Studio 54
Twenty-five years ago this week, Los Angeles was burning because of Rodney King’s beating at the hands of the fuzz,…
This is Brexit, Part II - God ordained the first one
If any more proof were needed that Brexit is the best thing to happen to Britain since 1066 and all…
The man who destroyed New York
Things that I once loved — Fifth Avenue & 57th Street, brownstone terraces on hot summer afternoons, cold beer and…
Pamela Harriman and the grandes horizontales
New York I’d gladly exchange waistlines with him if he’d teach me to cut a phrase the way he…
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