Times Literary Supplement (July 17, 2024): The latest issue features ‘World at War’ – Humanity’s appetite for organized violence; Should we have babies; Posture panic; The boy on the burning deck and Wales…
Country Life Magazine (July 16, 2024): The latest issue features ‘500 Shades of Green’ – Why is it the eye’s favorite hue; Rex Whistler’s triumph and tragedy; Big hearts and funny faces – the bull terrier and Alan Titchmarsh’s favorite flower show…
Our eyes can detect more of its shades than any other colour and its many hues are bound up with everything from jealousy to British racing cars—it’s all gone green for Lucien de Guise
‘Life is merrier when you live with a bull terrier’ owners tell Katy Birchall as she delves into the kindly and comic character beneath the muscular frame
Goodwill and gardening go hand in hand at the ‘beautifully formed’ Royal Windsor Flower Show—and Alan Titchmarsh wouldn’t miss it for the world
Rex Whistler refused to leave fighting the Second World War to ‘young boys’, but his courage and leadership was to cost him his life, as Allan Mallinson reveals
The Jersey chief minister picks a work that encapsulates the island’s spirit and determination
In the second of two articles, John Goodall investigates the 17th-century expansion that provided Lincoln College, Oxford, with a quite outstanding chapel
Music will ring around the Royal Albert Hall again this summer thanks to Henry Wood and his Proms, reveals Octavia Pollock
With more species around our shores than anywhere else in northern Europe, Ben Lerwill keeps his eyes peeled for porpoises, whales and dolphins
Hetty Lintell shells out on fine jewellery that is sure to impress
Debo Devonshire’s love of chic, chickens and Chatsworth in Derbyshire is celebrated in a new exhibition, discovers Kim Parker
Giles Kime explores large-scale wallpaper capable of transport-ing you to a whole new world
Tiffany Daneff marvels at the spectacular views that have been restored at the Old Rectory at Preston Capes, Northamptonshire
Crunchy fennel is a summer highlight for Melanie Johnson
Michael Billington is royally entertained as Shakespeare receives a modern, mirth-filled twist in Stratford and London
Less than six weeks before Democrats formally choose their nominee, the President is marching down a path of constant peril.
A network of well-funded far-right activists is preparing for the former President’s return to the White House. By Jonathan Blitzer
From the time of the Revolutionary War to the fires of the nineteen-seventies, the history of the borough has always been shaped by its in-between-ness.
By Ian Frazier
Stephen Sedley
Rae Armantrout
Thomas Meaney
Times Literary Supplement (July 10, 2024): The latest issue features ‘Ven ice Preserved – La Serenissima down the centuries; Why revolutions fail; Eating ourselves to death and Ozempic nation…
Country Life Magazine (July 9, 2024): The latest issue features ‘The Experts’ Experts – 185 heroes the top designers rely on; Top dogs – politics of the village show; Boar wars – what to do with wild pigs; Tea and cakes – the rise and rise of the sponge…
Giles Kime and Amelia Thorpe ask Britain’s leading lights in design to name the talented professionals who inspire and transform their own projects
Move over Crufts, the village pooch parade is the one they all want to win with local bragging rights hanging in the balance, as Madeleine Silver discovers
Pilfering pest or beneficial ecosystem engineer? Vicky Liddell examines the often-controversial return of wild boar to Britain’s woodland
How did the Victoria sponge rise to be fêted as the queen of all cakes? Flora Watkins indulges in the history of the nation’s favourite teatime treat
The interior designer chooses a powerful work that unlocks a whole range of emotions
Minette Batters insists that the incoming Government must be held to account over the many lavish pre-election promises on food security and farming
In the first of two articles, John Goodall charts the long, hard struggle to bring to fruition one Bishop of Lincoln’s dreams of establishing a college at Oxford
Amie Elizabeth White brews up a tale of 18th-century success as she celebrates Thomas Twining’s role as a tea pioneer
Hetty Lintell earns her summer stripes with elegant blue-and-white pieces for home and away
George Plumptre is heartened to witness a clever modern renovation of Nash’s Picturesque vision at Sandridge Park, Devon
Tom Parker Bowles harnesses the flame’s fickle power as he shares a chef’s secrets of the perfect barbecue technique
John Wright grasps the nettle in a hands-on investigation into the powers of the dock leaf—and, he says, it is your turn next
Smart Duke Street in London’s St James’s is the epicentre of British art. Carla Passino meets the larger-than-life characters who put the area on the map
Matthew Dennison can’t help but sing the praises of Isaac Watts, that most prolific of hymn writers born 350 years ago
James Fisher pays tribute to English cricket’s legendary fast bowler ahead of his farewell Test match against the West Indies
And much more‘
The actor talks about the origins of “Adaptation,” his potential leap to television, and the art of “keeping it enigmatic.”
By Susan Orlean
The wobbly distinction between reality and artifice fascinates Nicolas Cage. The first time we encountered each other was in 2001, during the making of “Adaptation”—a film based on Charlie Kaufman’s struggle to adapt my book “The Orchid Thief” for the screen—in which Cage played Kaufman and his twin, Donald. He was in the middle of a scene, and I tiptoed onto the set as quietly as possible, convinced that any distraction would trigger one of the eruptions for which Cage had become famous. Between takes, he glanced at the handful of people watching, and exclaimed cheerily, “Oh, guys, look!” He pointed at me and a small, fuzzy-haired man I hadn’t noticed beside me. “It’s the real Charlie and the real Susan!” He seemed tickled by this collision between the characters in the movie and their real-life counterparts, and insisted that the crew take note. (Kaufman and I, who had never met before that moment, slunk away sheepishly.)
Three decades into “This American Life,” the host thinks the show is doing some of its best work yet—even if he’s still jealous of “The Daily.”
By Sarah Larson
It can be easy to take the greatness of “This American Life,” the weekly public-radio show and podcast hosted by Ira Glass, for granted. The show, which Glass co-founded in 1995 at WBEZ, in Chicago, has had the same essential format for twenty-eight years and more than eight hundred episodes. It was instrumental in creating a genre of audio journalism that has flourished in recent decades, especially since the podcast boom—which was initiated by the show’s first spinoff, “Serial,” in 2014. Like “The Daily Show” or Second City, “This American Life” has trained a generation of talented people, and Glass’s three-act structures, chatty cadences, and mixture of analysis and whimsy are now so familiar as to seem unremarkable.
Plus: Hildegard Bechtler on the art of stage design, very fancy Victorian ice creams, the art market braces for stormy weather, a Madonna pregnant with meaning and a preview of Parcours des Mondes; reviews of Kafka in Oxford, the gardeners of the Bloomsbury Group, and the silversmith who struck gold for Tiffany & Co.
Country Life Magazine (July 2, 2024): The latest issue features ‘The Call of the Coast’; Seaside treasure – the museum on the cliff; What a scoop – secrets of the ice-cream makers; A boatbuilder’s life, Barbie’s lore and best beach clubs…
Ben Lerwill drops anchor in the Thames to meet master boat-builder Mark Edwards, whose eclectic roll call of clients includes Elizabeth II and George Clooney
Artisan ice cream makers have got it licked, says Madeleine Silver, as she checks out cones lovingly created using local milk and natural flavourings
Barbie is still in the pink at the age of 65. Susan Jenkins charts the ups and downs of Mattel’s often-controversial, yet still much-loved figurehead
Rosie Paterson reveals that Italy is still the place to go for unbeatable beach clubs, Richard MacKichan discovers the untouched isle of Formentera and Pamela Goodman carves out her own niche on a transatlantic cruise
The writer chooses a ‘gorgeous panorama’ bursting with fellowship and rustic merry-making
The country is all of a flutter in the build up to the General Election, but all bets are off for an exasperated Carla Carlisle
Kate Green marvels at the Minack, Rowena Cade’s breathtaking cliffside amphitheatre
Increasing numbers of jellyfish are wobbling their way into British waters, but there’s no need to be alarmed, says Helen Scales
Hetty Lintell’s bold sunglasses leave everyone else in the shade
Well-thought-out garden buildings are an ideal way to get closer to Nature, suggests Amelia Thorpe
Rosie Paterson goes up, up and away for the capital’s Balloon Regatta, Levison Wood is in the hotseat, Holly Black takes the wraps off the new-look Royal Academy Schools and Jemima Sissons is on the comeback trail
The D-Day landings were planned from its shores, but today George Plumptre finds a haven of peace at Lepe House in Hampshire
Tom Parker Bowles is seduced by the charms of the strawberry, that most flirtatious of fruits
Melanie Johnson savours the joy of sweet and floral apricots
All eyes are on St Swithin’s Day as Lia Leendertz examines what weather lore has in store
Literary Review – July 2, 2024: The latest issue features ‘A Tale of Two Fabulists’, North America Ablaze, Pascal Decoded, League of Dictators and Roffey’s Rage…
American Civil Wars: A Continental History, 1850–1873 By Alan Taylor
A mountain of historical studies testifies to enduring interest in the American Civil War, a conflict still politically relevant in a nation riven over how to remember it. Those doubting that there is anything fresh to say about the bloodiest event in the republic’s history should read Pulitzer Prize winner Alan Taylor’s brilliant, panoramic account of the conflict.
Travellers in the Golden Realm: How Mughal India Connected England to the World By Lubaaba Al-Azami
One contender for the title of centre of the civilised world in the early 17th century is the Mughal Empire. Lubaaba Al-Azami describes it as ‘a global capital and commercial hub’. The Mughal Empire reached its zenith between the reigns of Babur, the first emperor, who established the ‘golden realm’ in 1526, and his great-great-great-grandson the sixth emperor, Aurangzeb, who died in 1707. This was a time when the artists of the fabulously wealthy Mughal dynasty were building the Taj Mahal and writing and illuminating the Padshahnama.
Vertigo: The Rise and Fall of Weimar Germany 1918–1933 By Harald Jähner (Translated from German by Shaun Whiteside)
Takeover: Hitler’s Final Rise to Power By Timothy W Ryback
The Weimar Republic (so called as the parliament which drafted its constitution in 1919 sat in Weimar owing to unrest in Berlin) lasted for fourteen years and four months, two years longer than the Third Reich that succeeded it. Its history is beset with ironies. Its first president, Friedrich Ebert, a social democrat (and a former innkeeper), turned out to be the embodiment of petit-bourgeois conservatism. Having ditched the monarchy, he made a bargain with the army: they would defend the nascent republic in return for maintaining the old officer corps. This enabled the regime to survive five chaotic years marked by numerous violent attempts to overthrow it from both the Left and the Right.
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