July 2015

I try to avoid big cities these days, but they have their advantages. For example I went to Paris recently to the exhibition marking the 50th anniversary of Le Corbusier’s death. It is said that one should keep one’s friendships in good repair, but so it is with one enmities as well, and I can hardly think of a figure … [Read on]

In my long-distant childhood phase of collecting stamps – it was after the dinosaur phase which I now rather regret did not last the rest of my life – I thought that French stamps were among the most beautiful that there were. They were always engraved, they were monochrome, and generally had as their subject famous and beautiful buildings or … [Read on]

While insincerity is usually a vice, sincerity is not always a virtue.’ No method of electing a party leader could be better suited to the election of a dour monomaniac than that adopted by the Labour Party; and if the rumours are true that certain Tories have signed up to vote for Mr Corbyn because, if chosen, he would make Labour unelectable, nothing would better … [Read on]

No method of electing a party leader could be better suited to the election of a dour monomaniac than that adopted by the Labour Party; and if the rumours are true that certain Tories have signed up to vote for Mr Corbyn because, if chosen, he would make Labour unelectable, nothing would better illustrate the idiocy to which certain Tories … [Read on]

Tell me what you would like to ban, and I will tell you who you are. It occurred to me that a book of the ten things that a hundred intellectuals would like to ban would be very revealing. To be interesting, the intellectuals would have to imitate the analysand and say the first thing that came into their heads … [Read on]

Going by underground tunnel between terminals recently at Frankfurt Airport, I thought I saw, or rather heard, the future. To help the passengers on their way, to calm them down, de-stress them, as they hurried to catch their flight, birdsong was relayed over the public address system. Could it be that one day this recorded birdsong will be the only … [Read on]