Hilary Mantel has died at the age of 70. She became the first-ever winner of The Spectator/Shiva Naipaul Memorial Prize for travel writing in 1987. Mantel wrote for The Spectator as its film critic until 1991. She went on to win the 2009 and 2012 Booker Prize for Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies.
When Liz Truss entered the leadership race there was no such thing as ‘Trussonomics’. She began her campaign with no real expectation of winning and without any serious guiding philosophy. Rishi Sunak did her a great service by portraying her throughout the leadership campaign as a crazed tax-cutter, a disciple of Ronald Reagan. But in
Home Queen Elizabeth was buried in St George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle, beside her husband and father, after a funeral at Westminster Abbey. In the ten days of mourning, six days were devoted to a lying-in-state at Westminster Hall, for which the public queued around the clock, often for more than five miles and ten hours.
The TEN unclued lights are Scottish islands – or ‘INCHES’. First prize Mrs F.A. Bull, Canterbury Runners-up Susan Hay, Wolverhampton; J. and F. Daniels, Cremorne, NSW, Australia
The namesakes Some of history’s other Charles IIIs: – Charles III, King of Naples (1382-86): forced Pope Urban VI into exile, then moved to Hungary, whose throne he had assumed through marriage. Was assassinated. – Charles III, King of Navarre (1387-1425): made peace with France. – Charles III, Duke of Savoy (1504-53): lost when France
The Queen’s kindness Sir: Last week’s Spectator (17 September) was thoughtful, insightful and at times hilarious; just the tonic I needed. Many reading this will have their own memories of the Queen, but I would like to tell a personal story recounted by Christopher Chessun, the Lord Bishop of Southwark, in his address to the
The United States hasn’t always reacted rather snidely to the death of the British monarch. Below is The Spectator’s lead piece following the funeral of Queen Victoria in 1901, available on our fully-digitised archive. Nothing has been more striking, nothing more moving to the British as a nation, than the way in which the Queen
Today, the world says farewell to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. World leaders, including US president Joe Biden, French president Emmanuel Macron, and royals from across the globe have gathered in London for the country’s first state funeral in decades. Here is how the day will unfold: 10.35 a.m. The coffin bearers from the Queen’s Company, the
The reason the British people love the Queen, and are willing to die for her, is that they can understand what she is about, in a way that they cannot understand what the constitution, cabinet and parliament are about, or the Courts of Justice or the Bank of England, or any of the other abstractions
Sovereign’s states When she died, Elizabeth II was Queen of 14 nations other than the UK: Antigua and Barbuda; Australia; the Bahamas; Belize; Canada; Grenada; Jamaica; New Zealand; Papua New Guinea; St Kitts and Nevis; St Lucia; St Vincent and the Grenadines; the Solomon Islands; Tuvalu. – There are a further 18 countries of which
Majestic memories Sir: The sad news of the death of Queen Elizabeth II took me back 70 years to my earliest memory. I was three years old; the location was the Fleet Review at Spithead and the date was 15 June 1953, 13 days after the coronation. Some 325 ships of the Royal and Merchant
Home The body of Queen Elizabeth lay in state at Westminster Hall, in a coffin draped in the royal standard on which were placed the orb and sceptre, before her funeral in Westminster Abbey on 19 September, declared a bank holiday. She had died at Balmoral on the afternoon of 8 September, two days after
In death, as in life, Elizabeth II has been a unifying force for her country. For all the political rancour of recent years, this week has revealed a country at ease with itself. People of all political persuasions have come together to show their respect – in Scotland just as much as in England. It
Arthur C. Clarke (31/45) said that Ernest Hemingway (35/12) won a bet from fellow writers for the shortest story: FOR SALE. BABY SHOES. NEVER WORN. (30/14/15). First prize Nicholas Grandage, London W11 Runners-up Magdalena Deptula, Eton, Berkshire; R.P. Wright, Loughton, Essex
It’s hard to think of any Prime Minister who has entered office surrounded by such low expectations. Liz Truss was backed by just over half of Conservative party members and secured barely an eighth of MPs in the first ballot. Her critics dismiss her as a lightweight, wholly unsuited to tackling the problems now facing
In they come, out they go Liz Truss is the 15th prime minister to have served under Queen Elizabeth II, and her appointment was the 15th time the Queen has overseen a change of prime minister during her reign (Winston Churchill was already PM when she became Queen but Harold Wilson served twice). It would
Why we allowed it Sir: In her article ‘Why didn’t more people resist lockdown?’ (3 September), Lionel Shriver partially answers her own question. Priti Patel told us it was our public duty to shop our neighbours if they had three friends to tea, and our previously invisible police force started to patrol parks and beaches
Home Liz Truss, the new Prime Minister, said in a speech outside 10 Downing Street: ‘Boris Johnson delivered Brexit, the Covid vaccine and stood up to Russian aggression. History will see him as a hugely consequential prime minister.’ For her part: ‘I am confident that together we can ride out the storm.’ Earlier, on being
The quotation was ‘I WAS BORN TO SPEAK ALL MIRTH AND NO MATTER’ from Much Ado About Nothing (II.i.321) by WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. BEAT/RICE (23D/17) is the speaker and BENE/DICK (12/31) the sparring partner. Title: Much Ado About Nothing in cryptic form. First prize R.R. Alford, Oundle, Peterborough Runners-up Gordon Hobbs, Woodford Green, Essex; Fergus Jamieson,
Well, this is it folks. Thanks to all of you for coming out so early this morning. In only a couple of hours from now I will be in Balmoral to see Her Majesty the Queen and the torch will finally be passed to a new Conservative leader. The baton will be handed over in what
