Culture

Wednesday

Lloyd Evans

Big Brother and the limits of television

Big Brother is dead. This is terrific news – particularly if you’re one of those morbid hacks who specialise in articles lamenting ‘the excessive trivialisation of our culture’. Even now the long dreary ‘think-pieces’ are being commissioned for the Sunday papers. We all know what they’ll say. Big Brother (born 2000, died 2010, RIP) is responsible for creating the great scourge of modern culture, the noodle-brained, cross-eyed, half-witted celebrity. The ‘bad’ celebrity, in other words, of whom Jade Goody, (a BB graduate) is the outstanding examplar. Jade Goody will be contrasted – amidst much weeping and rending of garments – with the Platonic ideal of the ‘good celebrity’, the late

Tuesday

Matthew Dancona

Amis at 60

Martin Amis says that when a man turns 40 he stops saying “hi” and starts saying “bye”. So, as a 41-year-old, I now stand unequivocally on the farewell side of the tracks, putting my affairs gradually in order before the eventual arrival of the Grim Reaper – who in an Amis novel would probably be called Keith or Tel and speak an obscure London argot. Amis himself is 60 today and I wonder how significant a milestone that is for the writer himself. For his father’s generation, 60 was a moment freighted with messages – what Martin calls “the Information” in his novel of the same name – about work,

Monday

Sarah Standing

Breast is barred

Truth is indeed often stranger than fiction. It appears Big Brother is not just watching our every move but has also infiltrated our bodies. Speaking to a cranial surgeon over the weekend, I was fascinated to discover that most of our replaced, repaired or “surgically-enhanced” body parts are now bar-coded and given serial numbers – just like supermarket goods or a improbable plot devised by Ira Levin. Jasmine Fiore – the former Playboy model allegedly murdered by her boyfriend Ryan Alexander Jenkins – was recently identified by her breast implants. Her teeth had been forcibly removed, yet this did not deter detectives from their investigation. For those who strongly object

Matthew Dancona

Introducing Cappuccino Culture

Just to introduce The Spectator’s new team blog on arts and cultural affairs – Cappuccino Culture. Spectator writers will be posting all day, every day on what’s new and what matters in the cultural landscape: from arthouse movies to X Factor, from modern poetry to the latest production of Hamlet, all the reviews and the rows. Above all, we want you, our readers, to join the debate by making your own comments on each post. So please head over to new.spectator.co.uk/culture, and let’s embark on a cultural odyssey.

Wednesday

Matthew Dancona

A poetic evening

From its founder Joseph Addison – a poet of some significance – to its present poetry editor, Hugo Williams, the Spectator has always had a rich association with the poetic art. Indeed, an editorial by J.D.Scott in 1954 was widely regarded as the founding text of the so-called “Movement” of that decade; Vita Sackville-West, Sassoon, Freya Stark, Larkin, Kingsley Amis and James Michie have all played their part in this glorious history. So it was in the spirit of renewing our finest traditions that we hosted a very special poetry event at 22 Old Queen Street this evening – a standing-room only sell-out – featuring Sir Andrew Motion, Clive James,

Saturday

Matthew Dancona

Blur in the park

Been meaning to post all day a hat-tip to our very own Alex James who – before he was a Spectator columnist and celebrated cheese-maker – used to play the bass in a rather successful little group called Blur. Last night, reunited and re-energised, they played their final UK gig in Hyde Park. And, whether or not you were around first time to enjoy these great songs, it really was rather special. From the opening chords of “She’s So High”, it was clear that the band which defined “Cool Britannia” do not intend to fade into obsolescence with that New Labour-infected moment, nor to go through the motions like a

Thursday

Martin Bright

My Long-Delayed Re-Entry

Many, many apologies for my absence from the blog. I have been deep in the inner crevices and interstices of government searching for an escape route from the recession. Have I found it? You will find out next week when the New Deal of the MInd finally sees the light of day. The coalition of people who believe that we must act now to prevent the loss of a generation of creative and entrepreneurial talent has been building steadily and we are beginning to reach critical mass. The University of the Arts (all the London art colleges) and the British Council in the form of its think tank Counterpoint, have both