The prime minister is trapped by the mindset of the post-Brexit years
The country’s roads are nearly twice as dangerous as the rich-world average. It doesn’t have to be that way
As extremists win more votes across Europe, forming moderate and effective governments is getting harder
Free expression has become a culture war, and those who should defend it are staying quiet
The Guardian Weekly (September 5, 2024) – The new issue features Telegram’s collision course – The legal showdown between social networks and nation states. Plus: Tony Blair’s top leadership tips…
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Spotlight | Ukraine’s troops on their audacious incursion into Russia
Soldiers say they had no warning of what they were undertaking before the morale-boosting attack began, finds Shaun Walker in Sumy.
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Science | The flying scientists showing migrating birds the way home
Extinct in central Europe for 300 years, a flock of northern bald ibis is following a light aircraft on a migration route from Austria to Spain, reports Phoebe Weston.
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Feature | Tony Blair on the art of leadership
The former UK prime minister speaks to Andrew Rawnsley about relinquishing power, why he wouldn’t be fazed by a second Trump term – and why he’s an AI evangelist.
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Opinion | Why does Macron insist on playing king?
The French president’s refusal to appoint a new PM from the left displays breathtaking arrogance – and undermines democracy, argues Rokhaya Diallo.
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Culture | Look who’s back in anger
Will an Oasis reunion be a success? Definitely. Will it be worth it? Maybe, say Guardian arts writers.
Times Literary Supplement (September 4, 2024): The latest issue features ‘Sinister Beauty’ – Baudelaire and Les Fleurs du Mal; Hitler’s accomplices; No exit in Israel and Palestine; Posing for Lucian Freud and David Peace’s Munich…
Literary Review – September 3, 2024: The latest issue features @claire_harman on female detectives; @WomackPhilip on childhood reading; Georgina Adam on art market scandal; @dannykellywords on ageing rockstars and @mathewparris3 on the Queen
‘If there is an occupation for which women are utterly unfitted, it is that of the detective,’ claimed the Manchester Weekly Times in 1888 – already behind the times, it seems, as women had been acting the part for years, albeit invisibly. They had started to feature in detective fiction too. It was studying the burgeoning market in ‘lady detective’ stories post-1860 that led Sara Lodge to wonder who the fantasy sleuths were modelled on, and why the Victorians found them so disturbing and alluring.
It is hard to think of a person more qualified to write this book. In addition to being an art historian, a prolific writer, a lecturer and a broadcaster, James Stourton is also a former chairman of Sotheby’s UK. He joined the auction house in 1979 and left in 2012 to become a senior fellow at the Institute of Historical Research.
Plus:
Apollo celebrates 40 artists, patrons, thinkers and business-people blurring the line between art and craft; the Italian museum memorialising an unsolved plane crash; reviews of Paula Modersohn-Becker in New York, Elisabeth Frink’s menagerie, and Eileen Agar’s memoir of an unconventional life – and Jonathan Lethem remembers meeting a feather-brained friend in Maine
It’s hard to empirically determine whether they drive voters to the polls. But they might have less measurable effects.
Susan Katz Keating, the editor and publisher of Soldier of Fortune, discusses how she’s changing the publication and assesses the threat of political violence.
The A.I. revolution is coming to a pharmacy near you.
By Dhruv Khullar
Creation Lake by Rachel Kushner
Rachel Kushner’s fourth novel tells the story of a spy-for-hire who infiltrates the ranks of a radical French commune.
Why have right-wing ideas found such an eager audience among tech elites during Biden’s presidency?
During the last half-century, artists, curators, and scholars have been increasingly preoccupied with the idea of spectacle and with how to embrace, critique, or co-opt the power of work that envelops and overwhelms the viewer.
Jenny Holzer: Light Line – An exhibition at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York City, May 17–September 29, 2024
Tricks of the Light: Essays on Art and Spectacle by Jonathan Crary
The Avant-Gardists: Artists in Revolt in the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union, 1917–1935 by Sjeng Scheijen
Reading the Constitution: Why I Chose Pragmatism, Not Textualism by Stephen Breyer
In his new book, Reading the Constitution, Stephen Breyer criticizes recent Supreme Court decisions on issues such as abortion and gun rights as the product of rigid and imperfect reasoning rather than of ideology, and he argues for a more pragmatic jurisprudence.
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An ambitious strategy aims to cool the planet by dumping farmed seaweed on the sea floor. Will it work?
Focusing on temperature extremes can galvanize policy changes but risks undercounting
Building a Spanish megalith required sophisticated physics, geometry, and geology
It could kill millions—and spread chaos across Africa and the Middle East
Before reform and money comes courage
Welcome to the mirror world
Two contradictions could stymie the AI chipmaker-in-chief
Shortages are hampering the production of essential medicines
The Guardian Weekly (August 29, 2024) – The new issue features ‘Game Changers’ – Will the Paralympics make a difference for disabled people?
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Spotlight | Families on the frontline of the mpox outbreak
Carlos Mureithi and Ruth Alonga report from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where 96% of Africa’s 17,000 reported cases of the viral disease this year have occurred.
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Health | The quest to end the menopause
Women’s ovaries affect everything from metabolism to mood – so some scientists are trying to slow the way they age. But is it a good idea? Amy Fleming investigates.
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Feature | The evolution of Kamala Harris
After Kamala Harris’s triumphant speech at last week’s Democratic National Convention in Chicago, Janell Ross’s profile tells the story of the vice-president’s rapid rise to become a US presidential contender.
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Opinion | Escaping Russia’s legacy
Ukraine marked its independence day last weekend with the country still facing an uncertain future. Olga Rudenko’s eloquent piece explains why it was a bittersweet celebration of a defiant nation that refuses to bow to a tyrant and his armies.
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Culture | The podcast that made true crime truly popular
On the 10th anniversary of the streaming hit Serial, the show’s founder Sarah Koenig talks to Fiona Sturges about how it tapped into the amateur sleuth in us all.
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