Society

Thursday

Luke McShane

No. 686

White to play. Gelfand–Karjakin, Tal Memorial Blitz 2008. Gelfand’s pawn is pinned, and moving the king runs into more checks. But here he missed a surprising shot. What should White play? Email answers to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 24 January. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address and allow six weeks for prize delivery. Last week’s solution 1 Qh6! Bxh6 2 Nf6+ Kh8 3 Rxh7# Or 1…Re7 2 Rxe7 Bxh6 3 Nf6+ Kf8 4 Rc7# Last week’s winner Peter Keetley, London SW12

Pabulum

2539: Wider

Six unclued lights (all real words) are the names of 35/26 minus one letter. The missing letters match those that will appear in the shaded squares.   Across 1 Take in fire shoe for small firefighter? (11, two words) 7 Titian’s comb (3) 11 Bum governor newspaper backed (6) 15 Evil spirit with heart of grotty sod (5) 16 Camorrist’s gold lace (5) 17 Last part of game to finish (6, two words) 18 Bard’s ashes left in peace (5) 20 Abhorring PT slack stepdame cancels (6) 21 Capuchin pressing for porticos (5) 27 Palest Greek broods beside Troy (7) 29 German menials in sandals (5) 30 Cyst entered round

Lucy Vickery

2021 in sonnets

In Competition No. 3232, you were invited to retell a news story from the past year in sonnet form. An excellent entry this week included submissions ranging far and wide, from Harry Patch and the Everly Brothers to Alaskan walruses and Jeff Bezos’s penis. Commendations to Josephine Boyle, C. Paul Evans, Dorothy Pope, R.M. Goddard, Douglas Hall and Martin Elster, and £20 each to those printed below. For roofer Charlie Perry and his mates It was a time of Strongbow and cocaine, The chance to nullify decades of pain By getting early into altered states Then watching, with the pride that elevates, As English football claimed a cup again. In an uplifting, patriotic vein They crashed and

Susanna Gross

Bridge | 22 January 2022

Almost everyone has a set of ‘carding’ agreements with their partners to convey information when defending. But I’m always amazed by how many people feel compelled to do so at every turn, broadcasting loudly how many cards they have in each suit, and whether or not they hold an honour. The truth is, the better your opponents, the more they will make use of the information — and the better your partners, the less they need it. I know a couple of professionals who actually ban their clients from giving any signals at all. That was certainly true of the great Rixi Marcus. ‘Don’t give me any signals!’ she would

Pabulum

Christmas crossword 2021 – solution

The NATIVITY (89) of the ACTOR (37) HUMPHREY BOGART (47/13), the singers ANNIE LENNOX (112/12) and IAN BOSTRIDGE (4/61), the prolific BAT (34) ALASTAIR COOK (124/119), the colourful writer QUENTIN CRISP (90/92), the outré TV star KENNY EVERETT (97D/82), the expert at ‘THE PLAYING OF THE MERRY ORGAN’ (16/6/38) ORLANDO GIBBONS (99/1), the film producer ISMAIL MERCHANT (127/62), the mathematician who also watched ‘THE SILENT STARS GO BY’ (128/103/10) ISAAC NEWTON (9/55) and PRIME MINISTER (93A/79) JUSTIN TRUDEAU (66/39) was ‘ON THE FIRST DAY OF CHRISTMAS’ (50D/2A). Christmas crossword: the winners The first prize of £100, three prizes of £25 and six further prizes of Follow This Thread: A Maze

Wednesday

James Kirkup James Kirkup

Are sex offenders exploiting trans rights?

A few years ago, there was some controversy about the facts relating to people in prison who identify as transgender, and the proportion of those people jailed for committing sexual offences. The controversy started in 2018 when Fair Play for Women, a feminist campaign group, analysed English prison service data and estimated that 41 per cent of transwomen in prison were there for sexual offences. This conclusion was debated, often poorly, and disputed, unconvincingly, in several places. Four years on, this remains a heated, disputed topic. To some ‘gender-critical’ people, prisons are where the sex-gender debate becomes very real and very awkward. They are concerned that trans-inclusive policies make it

Tuesday

Annabel Denham

How to fix the BBC licence fee

Nadine Dorries came out fighting over the weekend to declare it was time to discuss new ways to fund and sell the ‘great British content’ produced by the BBC. But it turned out she had little in the way of ammunition once she reached the Commons yesterday. There will be a two-year freeze in the £159 fee — a measure that will represent a real-terms cut in the corporation’s funding, but hardly the ‘mortal threat’ some alarmists have declared. In 2019–20, the BBC generated total income of £4.94 billion, of which £3.52 billion was public funding from the licence fee. The Department for Culture, Media and Sport said the BBC

Monday

Sam Leith Sam Leith

What Meccano taught me

Elsewhere in England this weekend, grimly sweating middle-aged men were planning Operation Save Big Dog, Operation Red Meat and Operation Decommission Shopping Trolley. In our house, though, the only game in town for grimly sweating middle-aged men was Operation Racing Car. My son Jonah had received his Covid-postponed eighth birthday present from his cousins and it was – retro! – a Meccano set.  ‘Dad, can you help me build it?’ he asked, heteropatriarchonormatively. And of course I gladly forwent my planned afternoon doomscrolling Twitter to see how many new Downing Street parties would be unearthed. Because I had never done Meccano and I thought here was an opportunity to spend

Sunday

Alexander Larman

Is Britain really too dangerous for Harry and Meghan?

Shortly after his abdication in 1936, the now-Duke of Windsor wrote a series of letters while in European exile, in which he complained vociferously about numerous perceived privations that he faced. Chief amongst these was the provision for their security. The British government saw this as now being the Duke and Duchess of Windsor’s responsibility, rather than the country’s, but the Duke was infuriated by what he perceived his former kingdom’s ingratitude in not offering to foot the bill for his police protection. A similar dilemma now presents itself to Edward’s great-great-nephew the Duke of Sussex and his wife. Ever since their announcement of their quasi-abdication from their roles two

Andrew Doyle

Eric Gill’s crimes were unforgivable, but his statue is blameless

I like to think of myself as a latter-day Mother Shipton. I may not live in a cave in the north of Yorkshire, but I do occasionally dabble in prophecy. And, like Mother Shipton, I am accurate approximately roughly one per cent of the time. And I can prove it. In a diary piece for the Spectator in June 2020, I wrote the following: ‘Is it really any great leap to suppose that the same activists who would see a statue of Mahatma Gandhi toppled for his ‘problematic’ views might not wish the same fate on Eric Gill’s sculpture of Prospero and Ariel on the facade of the BBC’s Broadcasting

Michael Simmons Michael Simmons

Sage scenarios vs actual: an update

‘Deaths could hit 6,000 a day,’ reported the newspapers on 17 December. A day later documents for the 99th meeting of Sage were released which said that, without restrictions over and above ‘Plan B’, deaths would range from 600 to 6,000 a day. A summary of Sage advice, prepared for the Cabinet, gave three models of what could happen next: Do nothing (ie, stick with ‘Plan B’) and face “a minimum peak” of 3,000 hospitalisations a day and 600 to 6,000 deaths a day Implement ‘Stage 2’ restrictions (household bubbles, etc) and cut daily deaths to a lower range: 500 to 3,000. Implement ‘Stage 1’ restrictions (stay-at-home mandates) and cut deaths even further: to a range of 200 to 2,000 a day

Friday

Patrick West

James Treadwell and the true meaning of ‘cancel culture’

There’s an inherent contradiction at the heart of liberal thinking that perpetually raises its head. It’s one which has become ever-more pronounced in our age of ultra-progressive politics: the tension between equality and liberty. Many progressives think you can have both. Alas not. You can only have either, or a greater emphasis upon one at the expense of the other. This contradiction has once more been made evident today amidst reports of a lecturer who says he is the latest victim of ‘cancel culture’. James Treadwell, a professor of criminology at Staffordshire University, says that he is ‘being investigated for transphobia’ after his employer received ‘formal and official’ complaints about

Thursday

Alexander Larman

The decline and fall of Prince Andrew

The final judgement, when it came, was phrased with admirable economy. This evening’s statement from Buckingham Palace said simply that:  With The Queen’s approval and agreement, The Duke of York’s military affiliations and Royal patronages have been returned to The Queen. The Duke of York will continue not to undertake any public duties and is defending this case as a private citizen. In 42 words, Prince Andrew’s royal career has been extinguished forever. He has been reduced from being someone who was once second in line to the throne to being nothing more than a private citizen, and a publicly disgraced one at that. In 42 words, Prince Andrew’s royal

Tanya Gold Tanya Gold

The best schnitzel in London: Schnitzel Forever reviewed

It is a truism that there is never enough schnitzel (‘slice’, German); or, rather, schnitzel does not get the attention it deserves. Restaurants do serve it, of course. Fischer’s does a fine Wiener schnitzel, as part of its riotous pre-war Vienna tribute act, and elderly people, I am told, queue for it while wearing slankets. Brasseries sell it often: the perhaps unconscious desire to re-enact the meals of the Weimar Republic is one of the stranger things of the age. The Coffee Cup in Hampstead serves it with a jaunty side order of spaghetti pomodoro. But the (chicken) schnitzel has never had the stardust of the less interesting but more

The Spectator

2536: At rest – solution

The unclued lights (3 composers, 3 artists and 3 writers) are all buried in Père Lachaise Cemetery. The name should have a grave (accent), which is also thematic as it is a cemetery. First prize Miss Charlotte Bull, Leyton, London E11 Runners-up Mrs J. Warburton, Hertford; Prof. Colin Ratledge, Leven, E. Yorks

Doc

2535: Green light! Cross!

In this pangrammatical puzzle, the unclued lights are of a kind near 21A. Ignore all accents.   Across 7 Fresh out of Pinewood (3) 11 Prisoner’s popular winning move (6) 13 Sympathy strike at the docks? (7) 15 All the monks in class (5) 17 Some reach a téléphérique in Alpine ski resort (6) 18 A harp playing for Restoration playwright Behn (5) 21 Old German graduate going round Qawra’s isle (5) 22 Rice dish with bit of thyme dropped in on one’s knee (7) 27 New investment in gold bonds is for older women (7) 29 Little girl encountered in rubber boots (5) 30 Works Scott composed out East

Luke McShane

No. 685

White to play. Maxime Lagarde-Thai Dai Van Nguyen, Reykjavik 2021. Lagarde found a brilliant finish, forcing mate in just a few moves. What was his next move? Answers should be emailed to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 17 January. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address and allow six weeks for prize delivery. Last week’s solution 1 Rh4+ Nxh4 2 g4 mate Last week’s winner Cyril Berkeley, Reading, Berks

Luke McShane

When travel unravels

Recently, with some regret, I declined an invitation to play chess in the Netherlands. I fancied the trip, but alas it made little sense to commit to what would have been a fleeting visit. Travel hurdles have become a Rumsfeldian ‘known unknown’, and sure enough, that country was in lockdown not a week later, requiring quarantine on entry from the UK regardless of vaccination status. Would they ease restrictions in time? It was a relief not to have to think about it. I was mildly bitten last summer, when my plans to play in Germany were left in limbo a couple of months before the start. Owing to what was

Janet de Botton

Bridge | 15 January 2022

Why is defence so difficult? Why do I have to suffer partner’s incredulous face when I play the wrong card in a two-card ending? Again. My New Year resolution is to slow right down and try to work out Declarer’s shape before playing a card. Some hope. I was watching a YouTube video from a World Championship match a few years ago and two hands in a row turned up where the defence had ‘an easy four tricks’ against game but failed to take them. This was the second one: Marty Fleisher, one of the most gifted American sponsors, was sitting South, playing for the USA. His 4♥ bid on

Ysenda Maxtone Graham

The bittersweet truth about homemade marmalade

The spectrum of ‘bestowing homemade gifts on one’s friends’ ranges from giving to foisting. Pure giving is when you make something by hand especially for a particular person. Foisting is when you don’t let a friend leave your house before pressing a copy of your privately published memoir into their hands. Where does homemade marmalade come on this spectrum? I think it comes nearer the benign ‘giving’ end than homemade jam, which is at the ‘foisting’ end, along with homemade sloe gin and nettle ale. It’s the difference between treasure-giving and glut-giving. With marmalade, the driving force behind making the stuff is that you genuinely crave some, pouncing on the