Christmas Special

Britain deserves better in 2024

A Labour government would change the social atmosphere for the better and offer the hope of a new start.

Letter of the week: The Jewish left will continue

Write to [email protected] to have your thoughts voiced in the New Statesman magazine.

Robert Jenrick furthers his own migration to the upper Tory ranks

Your weekly dose of gossip from around Westminster.

Democracy in the era of deepfakes

In October a fabricated clip of Keir Starmer swearing at staff was shared. Imagine the impact if it had…

The hypocrisy of Rishi’s Right

Also this week: the power of the Nativity, and why books are like batteries.

Hana Videen: “It’s a pretty silly idea that there’s a pure English”

The author on the evolution of language.

The Tories are split into three camps and a shadow leadership contest is under way

Heading into an election year, the Conservative Party is in a dismal state – and Rishi Sunak is in…

Amid multiple crises, EU leaders cling to a misplaced optimism

Economic turmoil is on the horizon – the scariest of all outcomes for Europe would be a Trump victory.

Across Europe, far-right parties are rising

As the continent undergoes a rightwards shift, the liberal dream of open borders is dying.

Writing for children is hard, and they need good books more than ever

Children are ravenously hungry for ideas. We writers have a duty to provide them.

Israelis and Palestinians have been taken back to the traumas of 1948

Reporting from the front line in Gaza, I have seen the destruction wrought on all sides by this long…

This Christmas, it is hard to watch as our ancestral lands fragment

Israelis, Palestinians, Ukrainians and Armenians around the world have had to witness horrifying events from afar.

To keep winning, sports teams must fix what isn’t broken

Even harder than achieving success is continuing to achieve.

My reckoning with charismatic Christianity

There is an emptiness that the Church says only God can fill. But is He there?

On being the writer in the family

Writers exploit and rebel against their parents – but can never escape them.

Joseph Roth’s lessons for Putin’s Russia

A century ago The Radetzky March captured the break-up of Austria-Hungary. Could it also predict the fall of Vladimir…

What video games taught me

A collection of essays on gaming confirms the rich complexity of an art form that remains widely misunderstood.

The visions of Werner Herzog

In creating wild and strange new worlds, the German film-maker reveals the truth of our own.

Inside the erotic mind

Psychoanalyst Darian Leader’s study of the motivations behind sex and desire is irredeemably bonkers.

What it means to be German

Frank Trentmann’s history reveals how modern Germany found a new moral purpose after the horrors of Nazism.

The best children’s books for Christmas 2023

There’s fantasy, folklore and friendship in the best new books for young readers.

Lexicon of loss

The history of the elegy reveals how the poetry of grief has the power to trouble, console and unite.

The NS Poem: Sabotage

A new poem by Rebecca Farmer.

The 20 best books of 2023

Our choice of the year’s essential fiction and non-fiction.

Christmas in Hamburg

At the city’s festive markets shopping is not the objective: it is to meet friends and sip Glühwein.

Matthew Ball’s cerebral ballet

The Royal Ballet principal on embracing pain, bringing the unconscious to the stage, and the dance world after #MeToo.

Inside Elvis’s dollhouse

Sofia Coppola’s Priscilla Presley biopic shows how the singer groomed his teenage wife – but his obsession with young…

Notes on trying

For readers and writers, novels require enormous effort. Why do we persist in seeking meaning in their pages?

Maruyama Ōkyo: artist of the frozen world

The 18th-century Japanese painter learned lessons from Western art and used them more daringly than any European.

Timothée Chalamet is a sweeter – but weaker – Wonka

The Warner Bros origin story for the chocolatier adds songs and removes nastiness from Roald Dahl’s tale – for…

A strange and intimate Ghost Story

This podcast mixes true crime, family history and the paranormal – to intriguing effect.

The 20 best films and TV shows of 2023

Our choice of the year’s essential screen entertainment.

The bird that wasn’t there

Soon after the Bay thrush was discovered in 1774, it was lost. But we can no longer blame ignorance…

Can podcasts and acupressure get me through the icy winter months?

Perhaps the level of well-being we all seek is incompatible with being human.

At its midpoint, this season is shaping up to be one of football’s oddest

So far we’ve seen Dickensian midfielders, a blizzard of coaching jobs, and the return of peep-hole socks.

Cooking for others gives me purpose. That doesn’t mean I enjoy it

You know why chefs are skinny and have explosive tempers? Because their mothers try to help them in the…

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This England: Puffed-up pastry

This column – which, though named after a line in Shakespeare’s “Richard II”, refers to the whole of Britain…

Judi Dench’s Q&A: “Shakespeare’s rhythms are the beating of my heart”

The actor on Jennie Lee, Elizabeth Fry and her annoyance at those who throw away food on the sell-by…