Arts

More from Arts

Toby Young

Winning Lane

Since 25 October, I’ve been appearing seven times a week on stage, so getting to see anything has been extremely difficult. My last night is 15 January, so I’ll be able to resume my full reviewing duties after that, but in the meantime I thought I’d bring you up to date on the only three

Essential truths

This is a brave and thoughtful exhibition, for it addresses the needs both of a multifaith city, Liverpool, and an exhibition programme reliant on the collection resources of Tate Britain and Tate Modern. Representatives of several religions were given open access to the Tates’ collections. Part of the selection process acknowledged the dominant Christian– Judaic

Alternative history

The first part of the title of the Whitechapel’s latest portmanteau show is taken from Ezra Pound’s masterpiece of compression, the two-line poem ‘In a Station of the Metro’ — ‘The apparition of these faces in the crowd;/ Petals on a wet, black bough.’ The poem is a triumph of Imagism, the short-lived movement (c.1910–17)

Hard times | 15 January 2005

For many, the workhouse, particularly the Victorian variety, still conjures up in the popular imagination an image of dread and fear. I remember being taught about them at school and shuddering at the evocation of the Dickensian horror of these institutions. Everyone remembers the vivid experiences of Oliver Twist from either the novel or the

Yes man

‘Why do you buy so many CDs?’ asked my girlfriend. It was not an unreasonable question, although obviously I wasn’t going to admit that. There are all sorts of reasons why you might buy too many CDs. You are bored of the ones you have. There are things you want. You are terrified you might