THE NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE (03/07/2025): The 3.9.25 Issue features David Enrich on the attack on The New York Times v. Sullivan ruling and its protections for the press; Ruth Margalit on the activist Einav Zangauker, whose son is captive in Gaza; Jonah Weiner on the director Bong Joon Ho; and more.
The ‘Parasite’ Director Brings Class Warfare to Outer Space
Bong Joon Ho has turned his funny-sad excavations of life under capitalism into unlikely blockbusters. With “Mickey 17,” he’s bending a whole new genre.
A host of luminaries that were born in 1775 still shape British identity some 250 years on, as Matthew Dennison discovers
A horse walks into a bar…
Jack Watkins raises a glass to the Cheltenham superstars immortalised in the bars and restaurants at Prestbury Park
Interiors
Amelia Thorpe cooks up a real treat with the latest inspiration and innovations for the kitchen
London Life
– Amie Elizabeth White celebrates 100 years of the Dickens museum, plus Country Life’s guide to the best baked goods in the capital
Arts & antiques
Charles Dance talks to Carla Passino about Michelangelo, mentoring and why the Sistine chapel is like playing King Lear
The good, the bad and the ugly
Michael Hall delves into the genius of Michelangelo, at once the enfant prodige and enfant terribile of theRenaissance
Simon Martin’s favourite painting
The art-gallery director selects a beguiling 17th-century miniature revealing a connection to Nature
A regal renewal
John Goodall hails the revival of Restoration House in Kent, a magnificent property that welcomed Charles II in 1660
The legacy
Agnes Stamp hails the ‘British Barnum’ Charles Cruft, whose dog show is still best in class
Shiver me timbers
The once-popular black poplar could be our secret weapon in the battle against climate change, finds Vicky Liddell
The good stuff
Hetty Lintell’s top tips on what to wear to the Cheltenham Festival
And it was all yellow
Charles Quest-Ritson brightens his day with the cheerful flowers of the ever-dependable forsythia
Sharp practice
The thorny old issue of pruning roses, with Charles Quest-Ritson
Foraging
Is tapping birch-tree sap worth the bother, asks John Wright
Travel
Emma Love shares the latest cruise news, Imogen West-Knights finds everything shipshape in the South of France, John Niven follows in the wake of Mr Mississippi Mark Twain and Pamela Goodman’s birthday treats take on a life of their own
THE NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE:The 3.2.25 Issue features Amanda Hess on the actress Parker Posey; David Leonhardt on Denmark’s brand of progressive politics that features strict immigration measures; Daniel Bergner on the Israeli screenwriter Yehonatan Indursky; and more.Read this issue
How an Anguished Mother Became Netanyahu’s Fiercest Foe
Einav Zangauker, whose son is captive in Gaza, has made herself an enemy of the Israeli government by advocating relentlessly for a hostage deal.
Timothée Chalamet Should Win an Oscar for His Oscar Campaign
Lobbying the public to attract the votes of the academy is an odd practice — but you can’t say Chalamet hasn’t excelled at it.
In an Age of Right-Wing Populism, Why Are Denmark’s Liberals Winning?
Around the world, progressive parties have come to see tight immigration restrictions as unnecessary, even cruel. What if they’re actually the only way for progressivism to flourish?
Can Germany’s chancellor-in-waiting fend off the far right? Plus: Bong Joon-ho interviewed
Diverting our eyes away from Trumpworld for a moment this week, attention shifted to Germany where Friedrich Merz’s conservative CDU/CSU alliance came out on top in the country’s federal elections.
For many though, the story of the night belonged to the far-right Alternative für Deutschland, which received more than a fifth of the vote and came top in virtually the entire eastern side of the country. Merz’s alliance did not win an outright majority so, having previously vowed not to work with the AfD, the chancellor-in-waiting must now try to form a grand coalition with other mainstream parties, which is likely to include Olaf Scholz’s heavily defeated SPD.
Amid surging support for the far right, Ashifa Kassam and Deborah Cole report from Berlin, where many people from immigrant backgrounds feel real fear for the future. Kate Connolly looks at Merz’s bulging in-tray as likely new leader of the EU’s largest economy, while in an opinion piece Musa Okwonga writes powerfully about the extent of anti-migrant feeling and xenophobia in Germany’s “time of the cowards”.
THE NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE: The 2.23.25 Issue features Jonathan Mahler and Jim Rutenberg on the Murdochs’ succession drama; David Yaffe-Bellany on the cryptocurrency scam that turned a small community on itself; Ismail Muhammad on the comedian Roy Wood Jr….
Harper’s Magazine (February 19, 2025): The latest issue features ‘Round Two – Trump’s Futile War Against The Deep State; Listening for the Future of Music; RAchel Cusk on Marin Amis and The Softer Side of American Conspiracy Theories…
Kate Green celebrates the Revd Gilbert White, the original ecologist whose 1789 book on flora and fauna has never been out of print
Mad as a box of frogs
Our amphibious friends were once thought to possess mystical powers and they now aid the advance of medicine, as Ian Morton discovers
The ghost of golden daffodils
David Jones traces the fall and rise of the Tenby daffodil — all but extinct in the wild, but making a return as a cultivated bloom
The lure of Venice
Matthew Dennison investigates Britain’s long-standing love affair with the Italian maritime republic, fuelled by Canaletto’s enchanting, kaleidoscopic vedute
Playing the fool
Who could have foreseen the influence of tarot cards down the ages? Deborah Nicholls-Lee delves into decks and divination
Dr Ximena Fuentes Torrijo’s favourite painting
The Ambassador of Chile picks a vast, dreamlike Surrealist work that portrays a turbulent world.
A sense of delight
John Goodall marvels at the outstanding array of new and restored buildings on the grand Aldourie estate in Inverness-shire
Snakes and snails and puppy-dog tales
Matthew Dennison pays tribute to Peter and Iona Opie, who pre-served much-loved folklore and fairy tales for future generations
The good stuff
Work out in style with Hetty Lintell’s elegant exercise picks
Interiors
Amelia Thorpe shares the best of London Design Week wares, plus an elegant room with a view
Shaping the view
Tiffany Daneff admires the vista of rural Northamptonshire from the delightful Modernist garden created for a converted cart house
Foraging
Listen in as John Wright shares his thoughts on wood ears, the fungus with a gelatinous texture
Arts & antiques
Thomas Girtin’s exquisite landscapes were a match for Turner before the artist was cut down in his prime, reveals Carla Passino
History triumphs over invention
A brilliantly acted historical play conquers overproduced Greek mythology for Michael Billington
We’re just over three weeks into the second Donald Trump administration, and the pace of events both inside and outside the US has been dizzying and unprecedented.
Many of us have been alarmed by Trump’s shocking pronouncements on the Israel-Gaza war, trade tariffs and territorial claims on Greenland and Panama. But inside America, an equally startling transformation has been taking place.
Aided by the tech billionaire Elon Musk, Trump has moved swiftly to fire critics, reward allies, punish media, gut the federal government and exploit presidential immunity. Yet much of the blueprint comes not from Trump’s own policy team, but from a power-consolidation playbook established over the past decade by the Hungarian authoritarian leader Viktor Orbán.
The UK’s status as a world leader in creative industries will be in peril if we fail to nurture art-and-design skills in our schools, argues Tristram Hunt
Let’s fall in love
Laura Parker investigates the boxing, croaking, crooning, dad dancing and even murder that passes for courtship ritual in the animal kingdom
Beauty and the blimp
Could a new airship designed in Britain deliver eco-friendly aviation, asks Charles Harris
Interiors
Amelia Thorpe picks out glass acts in world of garden rooms, greenhouses and orangeries
Soup-er charged
Tom Parker Bowles reveals how to beef up a boozy, hot-as-Hades French onion soup
A leap in the dark
The play of light and shade has long defined Western art. Michael Hall examines what Constable called ‘the chiaroscuro of nature’
The Duke of Richmond’s favourite painting
The owner of Goodwood picks a work that reflects the sporting history of the West Sussex estate
Three wishes for food and farming
Minette Batters calls for the UK to set a self-sufficiency target for producing its own food
Nature and nurture
In the final article of a three-part series, Tim Richardson ponders the innovation and imagination behind the wonderful grounds at Bramham Park, West Yorkshire
The legacy
Amie Elizabeth White applauds altruistic John Ritchie Findlay, who paved the way for Scotland’s National Portrait Gallery
The good stuff
Hetty Lintell backs a winner with a range of horseshoe jewellery
Light work
Tiffany Daneff is dazzled by the transformation of a dark London garden into a light-filled oasis
Foraging
Winter mushrooms are a rarity, but the striking velvet shank earns John Wright’s approval as a welcome addition to game pie
Arts & antiques
Carla Passino marvels at the masterpieces amassed by Swiss collector Oskar Reinhart as the works go on show in London
Wick me up before you go-go
The wick trimmer’s work was never done in candlelit times, discovers Matthew Dennison
News, Views and Reviews For The Intellectually Curious
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