Society

Thursday

Quentin Letts

Best of the Blob: who would be picked for its 1st XV?

Selectors for the Blob have chosen their 1st XV. Fans of The Game sometimes ask, as they do about Barbarians RFC: ‘Who are these people, do they have any supporters and who exactly pays them?’ Well, now we have the answer to at least that first question. Full back: Sir Philip Barton, head of the diplomatic service. Recovering from injuries after a sticky select committee hearing on Afghanistan. Sometimes drops the ball but popular with professionals for telling civil servants not to work weekends or more than eight hours a day owing to dangers of ‘burn-out’. Was holidaying at a family château in the Dordogne while Afghanistan was crumbling. Good

Rod Liddle Rod Liddle

My meeting with the Durham University mob

My abiding memory of this fairly appalling year is of the face of the young student at Durham University who shouted ‘Disgusting!’ at me as I left the main college building. This followed a very short speech I’d given to about 250 students but which, I suspect, he hadn’t heard because he’d probably walked out before it began. That, incidentally, is one of the reasons this story in which I find myself took a comparatively long while to break. The speech was on a Friday evening — but it wasn’t until Monday, at the earliest, that the lefties got themselves into a real lather. Until then it had simply been

Mary Wakefield Mary Wakefield

Arthur Labinjo-Hughes’s death and the problem of evil

Since I first read about the torture and murder of six-year-old Arthur Labinjo-Hughes, I’ve had what feels like an A-level philosophy class running in my head. There are still those of us who believe in God, and are preparing to celebrate the birth of His son in a week or so. But how is it possible to square the existence of a good and omni-potent God with what happened to Arthur, and to the other children who suffer in the same way? Every year in this country, there are 50 or so children dead from abuse. Year in, year out, lockdown or not, that figure stays roughly the same. Is

Sarah, Duchess of York

What’s your kindness IQ?

A few weeks ago, MailOnline carried a rather mundane story about some personnel changes at my charity, Sarah’s Trust, and another I support as patron, Humanitas. The piece reported quite fairly some of the work that we have been doing, including supplying hundreds of sleeping bags and essential supplies to homeless people. I rarely venture into readers’ comments, finding the online world rather frightening, but for some reason on this occasion I decided to scroll through what people were saying. I should have been put off by the warning that greeted me: ‘The comments below have not been moderated.’ Someone calling themselves Russell Nash, of the Highlands, had written simply: ‘Leech.’

Ephraim Mirvis

Our new era of Jewish-Muslim relations

Reactions to the recent passing of F.W. de Klerk transported me back to my childhood in South Africa. The horror of apartheid was a frequent topic of conversation in our family. My uncle’s law firm, Witkin, Sidelsky and Eidelman, pioneered the employment of black people and gave Nelson Mandela his first job as a clerk, in defiance of the accepted practice at the time. My mother was the principal of the only training college for black pre-school teachers and my father, a rabbi, made pastoral visits to Robben Island. We were all-too-aware of the urgent need to dismantle the structural racism that plagued the country. When de Klerk and Mandela

Lissa Evans

Gus and his mate Mark: A short story by Lissa Evans

‘I’ve just seen a wen,’ said Gus, returning from the toilets. ‘A what?’ ‘A wen. It’s a benign thing, I can’t remember the proper name for it. It looked like a button mushroom growing out of this bloke’s head. Really hard not to stare.’ ‘A wen,’ repeated Mark, broodingly. ‘I’ve never even heard of it. How come you know about it and I don’t?’ He mentally added ‘wen’ to his personal 40-volume encyclopedia of medical ignorance. ‘I dunno, I heard it somewhere. Maybe you only know the clinical term.’ ‘Unlikely. I’m going to look it up.’ Mark took out his phone and exited the snug; there wasn’t much of a

Steven Pinker and Rory Sutherland

Sense and sensibility: Steven Pinker and Rory Sutherland on reason vs instinct

Steven Pinker’s latest book is called Rationality. Rory Sutherland is The Spectator’s Wiki Man. We arranged for them to meet at the Cucumber restaurant, where they discussed the logic of monarchy, gender-bending, and why academics are unreasonably obsessed with wine. Steven Pinker: Part of the reason I wrote Rationality was to ask, how there can be so much irrationality in an era that has the resources for unprecedented rationality. We invented a vaccine for Covid in less than a year. So why do people today believe in conspiracies like QAnon? Rory Sutherland: Conspiracy theories aren’t always irrational, and instinctive responses can serve you well. An instinctive person with no knowledge

Joan Collins and Taki

Hollywood, fist-fights and getting cancelled: Joan Collins and Taki in conversation

Introductions Scene: a drawing room in London. When the recording starts, Taki is already mid-anecdote… Taki: … I was sent out to Monte Carlo to speak to Roger Moore. The Spectator offered to pay all my expenses. I said thank you, I’ll pay my own. I went and had a terrific drunken dinner with Roger who really spilled the beans, cos we were buddies. I came back. The tape was empty because I’d never turned the recorder on. Joan: I’d known Roger since I was 15, because my father was a big agent in London and I came back from school — oh, 14 actually, because I left school at

Christopher Howse

2021 Christmas quiz

Rather odd In 2021: On which planet did Nasa fly a small helicopter called Ingenuity, bearing a fragment of the Wright brothers’ first aeroplane? A pair of trainers worn by which US basketball star during his first season with the Chicago Bulls in 1984 went for $1.47 million at auction? Which bridge got stuck with its bascules up after opening to let a sailing ship through? Twelve women became drivers on which capital city’s metro after a ban imposed in the 1980s was lifted? What killed 16 people taking selfies on top of a watch-tower in Jaipur? Who had painted a picture sold by Angelina Jolie for £7 million at

David Oakes

Why do we bother with Christmas trees?

The closest thing we have to a native Christmas tree is the often broccoli-shaped Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris). But the Norwegian spruce (Picea abies) is the classic Christmas tree. Despite it being present in Britain during the last interglacial period, it is not considered native. It did not return to Britain after the most recent thaw, waiting instead for human assistance in the 16th century. And it wasn’t until 1841, when Prince Albert brought a Norwegian spruce across from the European mainland to remind him of Christmas in Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, that the Christmas tree became a traditional part of our celebrations. The early Vikings also placed a tree at

The Spectator

How to cure what ails the NHS

Wrong cure Sir: In referring to the UK as the highest-spending European nation in healthcare proportionate to GDP (‘Hospital pass’, 4 December), Kate Andrews paints an exaggerated picture which is based upon additional expenditure in the NHS during the Covid pandemic, partly accounted for by £38 billion spent on test and trace. The figures are further inflated by the UK suffering a relatively greater fall in GDP. In reality, the NHS has been woefully under-resourced compared to its European counterparts over the past decade, leaving it with approximately 50,000 fewer doctors compared to OECD averages, the second-lowest numbers of hospital beds per capita, and the lowest numbers of MRI scanners.

Olivia Potts Olivia Potts

The sheer joy of a sherry trifle

Christmas brings out the best and the worst in me. It’s a chance to give in to my inclination to feed all my nearest and dearest at once, and also to show off a bit. I love the prep, from the shopping lists to the veg peeling, and I love the wind-down, from the leftovers to the decimated tins of chocolates. Am I controlling about Christmas? Yes, probably. But it all comes from a place of overexcitement. This year, however, Christmas looks a little different. On Christmas Day itself, I am likely to be 40 weeks pregnant with my first baby. This means that not only am I not masterminding

Toby Young Toby Young

Some (tentative) reasons to be cheerful in 2022

Someone sent me a job advert recently for a Junior Research Fellowship at Queen’s College, Oxford. It states: ‘The Queen’s College embraces diversity and equal opportunity. Applications are particularly welcome from women and black and minority ethnic candidates, who are under-represented in academic posts in Oxford. The more inclusive we are, the better our work will be.’ Nothing particularly objectionable about that, although when the college says it aspires to be more ‘inclusive’ it doesn’t mean it wants conservatives to apply, even though they are among the most under–represented groups at Oxford. It makes that clear when it goes on to say Queen’s shares the university’s commitment to promoting equality

Dot Wordsworth

2021’s word of the year: ‘cis’

The newspapers came out on Christmas Day in the middle of the 19th century and listed in columns of small type all the pantomimes for the next day. Among them in 1856 was Paul Pry on Horseback, or, Harlequin and the Magic Horse-shoe, a ‘grand comic equestrian pantomime’. For it was at Astley’s, which presented all its entertainments on horseback. Since Astley’s, like many theatres, had burnt down on several occasions, it was bold to include in this panto a ‘Fire Horse’ and a ‘Chariot of Fire’. That year it survived the risk. Astley’s Theatre stood at the south end of Westminster Bridge, opposite today’s modern part of St Thomas’

The Spectator

2534: Off-pitch – solution

The unclued lights are cricket fielding positions. The clues contain the names of 12 present and former England cricketers: Old, Such, Onions, Grace, Jones, Crawley, May, Prior, Wood, Stokes, Cook, Anderson. First prize Alan Pink, Crowhurst, East Sussex Runners-up Amanda Spielman, London SW4; Roger Vander Steen, Edinburgh

Lucy Vickery

Spectator competition winners: Harold Pinter’s Nativity

In Competition No. 3229, you were invited to provide the story of the Nativity retold in the style of a well-known author. Star performers, in a most excellent entry, included Janine Beacham’s W.S. Gilbert: Young Mary was the model of a good and humble Nazarene, So Gabriel requested of her, ‘be our human go-between, you will conceive a holy child, in keeping with theocracy, you and your husband Joseph will be sainthood’s aristocracy… Brian Murdoch and Nicholas Lee were also snapping at the winners’ heels, but after lengthy deliberation I have pleasure in awarding £25 each to the authors of the submissions printed below. A happy Christmas to you all. Do you remember

Luke McShane

No. 683

White to play and mate in 3. Composed by Albert Barbe, 1861. Only the first move is required, but it’s not as obvious as it looks! Answers should be emailed to chess@spectator.co.uk by Tuesday 4 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 Qf3, e.g. 1…Ka3 2 Nc2# or 1…a3 2 Nd5#, or 1…c4 2 Qf8# or 1…Nxf3 2 Nd3#

Peter Jones

Was Penelope really a ‘silenced’ woman?

Problems about the misuse of history, especially on subjects such as race and colonialism, have been running for a long time. But when it comes to the ancient world, there are also problems about the misuse of literature. Dame Mary Beard’s ‘manifesto’ Women and Power (2018) contains an example of the problem. Her thesis is that women’s voices in the public sphere (my emphasis) have been ‘silenced’ by men ever since the West’s first literature (Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey) gave us our first access to ‘western’ thoughts, deeds, beliefs, hopes and fears (c. 700 BC). The problem exists in the first example of her thesis, to which she returns four

Jools Holland

What musicians like me learned from the pandemic

My mother died earlier this year aged 85. She left me her old pianola. These were popular in the 1920s and 1930s before people had records and hi-fis. You would put the rolls on the pianolas and they were cut by the great pianists of the day, from the popular players like Charlie Kunz, as well as the star jazz and rhythm pianists like Fats Waller or Jelly Roll Morton, and also the great concert pianists like Rubinstein. You would simply put the piano roll on and then pedal away. The old war-damaged pianola had been left to her by her mother — and I learnt in my grandmother’s front