From ‘W.G.’, The Spectator, 30 October 1915: The late Dr. W.G. Grace had become in his lifetime a legend, and he is likely to remain a legend as long as Englishmen play games. Never was such a cricketer; and it is almost safe to say that there will never be such a cricketer again, for the perfection
Last night, The Spectator hosted a discussion between Ben Bernanke and Andrew Neil about the financial crisis and its aftermath. Mr Bernanke, who was chairman of the US Federal Reserve during the crash and Great Recession, spoke about a number of different topics. Initially, conversation focussed on the buildup to the crash. ‘What made the crisis so bad
This podcast was sponsored by King and Wood Mallesons. Is technological change a good thing for the British economy? In this View from 22 special podcast, The Spectator’s Fraser Nelson discusses the disruptive impact of new technologies with Julian David, CEO of Tech UK, Andrew Pinnington, CEO of Hailo and Rob Day, a partner at King and Wood Mallesons.
‘OK, it’s transgender, genderfluid, pansexual, genderqueer…’
‘Is he talking yet?’
‘Well... I can’t see any moles’
‘What’s a pen?’
‘I hope President Xi raises the issue of why we’ve been imprisoned here for so long.’
‘I wish you wouldn’t hitch your skirts up like that, Fiona, it makes you look like a right slag.’
‘Simon is becoming so violent during sex that I’m worried he may break the computer.’
‘Millions of people from all over the world got on terribly well with each other again today…’
‘What’s this Eurocentric crap doing on my desk?’
Scotland isn’t failing Sir: It will take more than Adam Tomkins descending from the heights of academe to persuade the Scots that education, health, policing and everything else in Scotland is failing (‘The SNP’s One-Party State,’ 17 October). Scots aren’t stupid: they have heard all this before from the unionist press, and they don’t believe it.
Just over 30 years ago, Margaret Thatcher’s government decided to look at local government finance. A young aide, John Redwood, outlined ‘some kind of poll tax which is paid by every elector’. Discussions continued, and bright young men (including the young Oliver Letwin) assured the Prime Minister that the figures would all stack up. Unpopular
Home Xi Jinping, the ruler of China, came, with his wife Peng Liyuan, a folk singer, for a state visit to Britain, to address both Houses of Parliament and to stay at Buckingham Palace. Tata Steel announced the loss of 900 jobs in Scunthorpe and 270 in Lanarkshire. This followed the liquidation of SSI, Britain’s
Bigger Bens Big Ben will have a £29m refurbishment. Who has the biggest clock tower? Kremlin Clock: Installed on the 232ft Spasskaya Tower. Clock has a diameter of 20ft. Big Ben: Installed on 315ft Elizabeth Tower. Clock faces are 24ft across. Metropolitan Life Insurance Building, New York: 700ft high (although the clock is only two-thirds
From ‘Reprisals’, The Spectator, 23 October 1915: The Germans lately executed Miss Cavell, a good and brave English hospital nurse, on a charge of harbouring fugitives. Are Englishmen prepared for such reprisals as this execution suggests? … Is there a single Englishman, no matter how many public meetings he has attended in support of reprisals, and no matter how
Boris Johnson has recently returned from a tour of Japan. His diary of the trip appears in this week’s issue of The Spectator: Frankly I don’t know why the British media made such a big fat fuss last week when I accidentally flattened a ten-year-old Japanese rugby player called Toki. He got to his feet.
