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William Cook

Barren, windswept beauty: the town’s beachfront

Southend-on-Sea has long been a running joke – until now

William Cook 7 April 2018 9:00 am

Standing at the end of Britain’s longest pier, on a cold and misty morning, looking out across the Thames Estuary,…

Sebastian Kurz, 31, the youngest national leader in the world

Young, dynamic – and a pragmatist: meet Sebastian Kurz

William Cook 24 March 2018 4:00 am

Austria’s young Chancellor is building bridges with the populists, writes William Cook

Founded by Constantine: the Catholic cathedral

Marx in Trier

William Cook 17 February 2018 9:00 am

‘Trier hates you,’ reads the graffiti outside the Karl-Marx-Wohnhaus in Trier. Actually, that’s a bit unfair. Trier doesn’t hate Marx,…

The wild, wintry wonders of Lapland

William Cook 6 January 2018 9:00 am

William Cook on the beauty and raw power of Lapland’s natural world

Anthologies to bring comfort and joy

William Cook 16 December 2017 9:00 am

John Julius Norwich loves Christmas dearly. ‘I just wish it didn’t come round about every three months,’ he says. I…

How the Gibraltar Open is rocking the chessboard

William Cook 2 December 2017 9:00 am

Chess is traditionally a mind gym for badly dressed men. The Gibraltar Open is changing all that, says William Cook

Where did it all go wrong for Angela Merkel?

William Cook 25 November 2017 9:00 am

The breakdown of coalition talks is uniquely damaging for the German leader

Notes on Lewes

William Cook 28 October 2017 9:00 am

Autumn is upon us, and the streets are full of families in fancy dress. People of all ages are dressing…

Anish Kapoor’s Cloud Gate in Millennium Park

In search of Chicago’s artistic past – and present

William Cook 14 October 2017 9:00 am

The Windy City has inspired everyone from Hemingway to Saul Bellow – and now William Cook

Sport in our state schools is in a sorry state of play

William Cook 9 September 2017 9:00 am

Sport in state schools is not up to par, writes William Cook

Why everyone’s fighting to come third in Germany’s election

William Cook 9 September 2017 9:00 am

The real prize in Germany’s election is to come third

Master of the dark art of interrogation: Alexander Scotland in 1945

The British interrogation methods that even Hitler found ‘ingenious’

William Cook 2 September 2017 9:00 am

Hidden behind Kensington Palace, in one of London’s smartest streets, there is a grand old house which played a leading…

How James Ivory made Howards End

William Cook 22 July 2017 9:00 am

As one of his greatest films returns to the cinema, James Ivory talks to William Cook about his 50-year career

Thanks to Donald Trump, Angela Merkel is back at the centre of the international stage

Why we should care about the German elections

William Cook 1 July 2017 9:00 am

A year ago, Angela Merkel looked like a dead woman walking. Not any more, says William Cook

Sheep thrills: holidaying on a working farm

West Middlewick Farm

William Cook 17 June 2017 9:00 am

In springtime in our family, we always have the same old argument: where should we go on our summer holiday…

His fair lady

William Cook 17 June 2017 9:00 am

Audrey Hepburn and Hubert de Givenchy had the most elegant of creative friendships. In Hepburn, Givenchy found his muse and the personification of his style.

Sweet and sour: Michelle Holmes (Sue, centre) and Siobhan Finneran (Rita, centre right) in ‘Rita, Sue and Bob Too’

Thirty years on, Rita, Sue and Bob Too remains one of Britain's greatest films

William Cook 6 May 2017 9:00 am

Hilary Mantel called the film ‘remorselessly indecent’, but William Cook fell head over heels in love with Rita, Sue and Bob Too

Glory days: Charlotte Rampling at the lido in 1965

Ruislip Lido

William Cook 29 April 2017 9:00 am

Most mornings, if I’m not too hung-over, I go for a run around Ruislip Lido — a mile there, through…

Rostock, in north Germany, joined the Hanseatic League in 1251. It has one of the oldest universities in Europe and was a major ship-building city for the Baltic

Germany’s history might have been as peaceful (and dull) as Switzerland’s

William Cook 29 April 2017 9:00 am

Go into any high street bookshop and find the European history section. There’s usually a shelf or two on France…

This election will be won or lost on the suburban battleground

William Cook 22 April 2017 9:00 am

The PM knows victory is to be found among the privet hedges

‘The Four Elements’, before 1937, by Adolf Ziegler, which hung above Hitler’s fireplace

Was Nazi art really that bad?

William Cook 14 January 2017 9:00 am

Bad men and bad politics don’t necessarily equal bad art. So perhaps it’s time to reassess Hitler’s taste in painting, says William Cook

Room and board in the elegant grounds of ­Ezzahra

A match made in heaven

William Cook 31 December 2016 9:00 am

Chess fan William Cook takes a masterclass in Marrakech

A visitor to Atlantis: Frank Zappa

Zurich’s hidden rock’n’roll side

William Cook 26 November 2016 9:00 am

On the green edge of Zurich, where this neat and tidy city melts into neat and tidy countryside, an icon…

The secret of the universe in 250 pages

William Cook 19 November 2016 9:00 am

A few years ago, in Berne, I visited the apartment where Einstein wrote his theory of special relativity, which changed…

Above and below: apprentices at Jaeger-LeCoultre

The real secret of Swiss watch craft: apprentices

William Cook 3 November 2016 9:00 am

Switzerland’s watch apprentices are all winners, says William Cook

1 2 3 4 5 »

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