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Wednesday

Druin Burch

J.K. Rowling is a phenomenal plotter

As I write, a copy of The Hallmarked Man sits beside me. Not being on holiday, spending the morning reading a new detective novel would seem as louche as a pre-brunch martini. Not being David Niven, I’m making the book wait until at least after lunch. J.K. Rowling’s new book, under her pen name of Robert Galbraith, comes in at around 900 pages. I expect to rip through it smartly. I am not an ideal reader of detective fiction, nor the thrillers and mysteries that have a whodunit at the core of their tightly planned plots. My ability to figure out the murderer – even my interest in trying –

Alexander Larman

Why does an American billionaire want an Oxford pub?

If you’re a fan of American billionaires buying up much-loved British institutions, then you, too, might be rejoicing at news that Larry Ellison has set his sights on purchasing much of Oxford. The squillionaire owner of the software technology company Oracle (net worth: $270 billion, or thereabouts) has started relatively small, however. In addition to spending a huge amount of money on the Ellison Institute of Technology in the city’s Science Park, he has also paid a supposed $10 million for one of its best-known and most-loved alehouses, the Eagle and Child, aka ‘the Bird and Baby’. The pub is bang in the centre of Oxford on St Giles and

Lloyd Evans Lloyd Evans

David Bowie’s roguish plans for a Spectator musical

David Bowie wrote a musical. Well, nearly. A cache of notes found in his New York apartment after his death indicates that he was planning a new theatre project in the final months of his life. The archive includes the phrase ‘18th cent musical’ among a collection of Post-it stickers filled with ideas and motifs. Creating a musical would have satisfied a lifelong ambition. ‘Right at the very beginning,’ he told the BBC in 2002, ‘I really wanted to write for the theatre. I could have just written for theatre in my living room but I think the intent was to have a pretty big audience.’ He seems to have

Tuesday

Angus Colwell

Lime bikes are dangerous. That’s why I love them

London on Monday night was mad and hilarious. At the Hyde Park Corner crossing, the number of people on Lime bikes must have been approaching 100. Invariably described as menaces, murderers and leg-breakers, these Lime bikes and their riders waited for the traffic light to turn green. When it did, battalions of these 35-kilo machines toppled and wobbled around each other, as the same number came in the other direction, green and white overwhelming the eyes. Yet no knees were crunched, no one fell off and those brave enough managed to render the tube strikes a minor inconvenience. If you believe in the state as protector, nanny and moraliser, and

Nigel Jones

Britain’s problem? We’re too nice

Studying our national character and current malaise has convinced me that the root cause of Britain’s problems is that we are too nice. Compared with our nearest European neighbours, let alone with most other countries in the world, being British automatically confers a series of characteristics not generally shared elsewhere. For a start we are polite. We do not shove ahead of other people in queues like the Italians, nor do we scream obscenities at random strangers in the street as they do in New York, and buying a cup of coffee is not regarded as a personal insult by cafés staff, as it is in Paris, for example. We