Personal story: What makes us mortal
Twenty years after my father’s terminal cancer diagnosis, I listened to my spouse’s doctor reveal the same news – but, this…
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Ten lessons of the pandemic
The rise of the technopopulists
From Macron’s En Marche! to the Conservatives’ “Get Brexit Done”: how populists embraced the language of science and expertise.
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Ten lessons of the Covid-19 pandemic
Around the world, coronavirus has revealed profound flaws in our politics. Will we do any better in the next crisis?…
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Tom Bower’s Boris Johnson biography is thin, imprecise and poorly written
The Gambler brings to mind that old cliché: it is both good and original, but what is good is…
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Why we need Hilary Mantel’s critical snark
In her new collection Mantel Pieces, Hilary Mantel’s critical voice is superior, unkind – and deeply enjoyable.
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The radical legacy of Shulamith Firestone
Why Firestone’s groundbreaking manifesto The Dialectic of Sex, first published in 1970, still feels radical today.
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NS Recommends: New books from John Cooper Clarke, Alice Martin and Annie Quick, and Nicole Krauss
Cooper Clarke’s I Wanna Be Yours, Martin and Quick’s Unions Renewed, Krauss’s To Be a Man, and In the Kitchen: Essays…
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How Akseli Gallen-Kallela captured Finland
In his painting of one of the country’s many lakes, Gallen-Kallela saw a nation rippling into life.
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Hermione Lee on how to write a life
Lee is known for her landmark biographies of writers such as Virginia Woolf and Edith Wharton. Now, she has…
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The blood and guts of BBC One’s Roadkill
Everyone in it is paying the price for some bit of bad behaviour, their innards, metaphorically speaking, trailing behind…
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Revisiting the life of Princess Diana
The podcast You’re Wrong About re-examines the long-established narratives surrounding the Princess of Wales with renewed empathy.
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Sweden’s Anders Tegnell: We did not pursue “herd immunity” against Covid-19
The Swedish state epidemiologist defends his country’s handling of the virus and gives his verdict on the UK’s coronavirus…
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Britain is entering a postwar reckoning and Boris Johnson needs a vision for the future
The Prime Minister needs to develop a vision equally for solving the major problems that lie ahead in the next…
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Commons Confidential: Arron Banks and his “Bad Boys of Brexit” fail to take New Zealand
Your weekly dose of gossip from around Westminster.
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Sanna Marin: Finland’s fearless prime minister is challenging sexism in politics
Marin, who was the world’s youngest head of government when she entered office in December 2019 at the age…
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Repeated testing can catch prostate cancer – but it also creates a terrible dilemma
I groaned inwardly when the results of Jeremy’s MRI scan came through: a couple of “indeterminate” areas. Not the definitive…
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Ocean Vuong Q&A: “Batman is just a billionaire with a cool butler“
The author on Wright Morris’s About Fiction, not writing for an audience, and his ten-year-old cousin.
ByEmail [email protected] if you would like to be the New Statesman’s Subscriber of the Week.
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Stuck in London due to Covid, I travel to Portugal via my imagination and my wine glass
The countryside seems so much more appealing than the city during a pandemic.
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In the midst of my money woes, the instructions for my new kettle prove a welcome diversion
Having moved into my new flat, I realise costs that have been hitherto hidden from me – water, gas,…
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Why I finally deleted my Facebook account after watching Netflix’s The Social Dilemma
The only industries that refer to their customers as “users”, viewers of the documentary are reminded, are tech and illegal…
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This England: The cones hotline
This column – which, though named after a line in Shakespeare’s “Richard II”, refers to the whole of Britain…
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Letter of the week: Image of hope for Yemen
A selection of the best letters received from our readers this week. Email [email protected] to have your thoughts voiced…
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Leader: Lessons from the plague year
In the UK, Covid-19 has interacted with pre-existing medical and social ills to lethal effect. We cannot cure them by simply…
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Lockdown’s fragile idyll, the 10’o’clock habit, and crossing the border for Waitrose
Although my NS series on Europe is having a long sleep, I have visited a foreign country six times since March:…
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Scotland’s place in the Union is precarious but independence would not bring stability
If Boris Johnson were to refuse another referendum, it would be harder to persuade Scottish voters that they are better…
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English football is at war with itself: its foundations are unstable and its future is uncertain
Covid-19 has accelerated football’s problems, but the widening financial inequalities and the absence of accountability or transparency pre-dated the pandemic.
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As the presidential election approaches, the US is still haunted by the shock of 2016
But this election is remarkable not for the ways in which it is like 2016, but for the ways…
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Manchester’s refusal to accept tier three has exposed what Westminster forgets about “the north”
“The north-west” or “the north-east” is nobody’s principal unit of identity. We live closer to home than that.
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Joe Biden’s foreign policy would not be a total departure from that of Donald Trump
If he triumphs in the election on 3 November, Biden’s approach could come as a rude awakening for some…
By
Keir Starmer’s support for a circuit breaker lockdown is smart politics – but it’s not an easy fix
The two-week lockdown has the same problem as Labour’s general Covid-19 strategy: it leaves the party backing partial measures.
By NS Recommends: New books from John Cooper Clarke, Alice Martin and Annie Quick, and Nicole Krauss
Cooper Clarke’s I Wanna Be Yours, Martin and Quick’s Unions Renewed, Krauss’s To Be a Man, and In the Kitchen: Essays…
By Sanna Marin: Finland’s fearless prime minister is challenging sexism in politics
Marin, who was the world’s youngest head of government when she entered office in December 2019 at the age…
By Commons Confidential: Arron Banks and his “Bad Boys of Brexit” fail to take New Zealand
Your weekly dose of gossip from around Westminster.
By The blood and guts of BBC One’s Roadkill
Everyone in it is paying the price for some bit of bad behaviour, their innards, metaphorically speaking, trailing behind…
By Revisiting the life of Princess Diana
The podcast You’re Wrong About re-examines the long-established narratives surrounding the Princess of Wales with renewed empathy.
By Britain is entering a postwar reckoning and Boris Johnson needs a vision for the future
The Prime Minister needs to develop a vision equally for solving the major problems that lie ahead in the next…
By Stuck in London due to Covid, I travel to Portugal via my imagination and my wine glass
The countryside seems so much more appealing than the city during a pandemic.
By English football is at war with itself: its foundations are unstable and its future is uncertain
Covid-19 has accelerated football’s problems, but the widening financial inequalities and the absence of accountability or transparency pre-dated the pandemic.
By In the midst of my money woes, the instructions for my new kettle prove a welcome diversion
Having moved into my new flat, I realise costs that have been hitherto hidden from me – water, gas,…
By Why I finally deleted my Facebook account after watching Netflix’s The Social Dilemma
The only industries that refer to their customers as “users”, viewers of the documentary are reminded, are tech and illegal…
By Scotland’s place in the Union is precarious but independence would not bring stability
If Boris Johnson were to refuse another referendum, it would be harder to persuade Scottish voters that they are better…
By This England: The cones hotline
This column – which, though named after a line in Shakespeare’s “Richard II”, refers to the whole of Britain…
By As the presidential election approaches, the US is still haunted by the shock of 2016
But this election is remarkable not for the ways in which it is like 2016, but for the ways…
By Repeated testing can catch prostate cancer – but it also creates a terrible dilemma
I groaned inwardly when the results of Jeremy’s MRI scan came through: a couple of “indeterminate” areas. Not the definitive…
By Manchester’s refusal to accept tier three has exposed what Westminster forgets about “the north”
“The north-west” or “the north-east” is nobody’s principal unit of identity. We live closer to home than that.
ByEmail [email protected] if you would like to be the New Statesman’s Subscriber of the Week.
By Lockdown’s fragile idyll, the 10’o’clock habit, and crossing the border for Waitrose
Although my NS series on Europe is having a long sleep, I have visited a foreign country six times since March:…
By Ocean Vuong Q&A: “Batman is just a billionaire with a cool butler“
The author on Wright Morris’s About Fiction, not writing for an audience, and his ten-year-old cousin.
By Joe Biden’s foreign policy would not be a total departure from that of Donald Trump
If he triumphs in the election on 3 November, Biden’s approach could come as a rude awakening for some…
By Keir Starmer’s support for a circuit breaker lockdown is smart politics – but it’s not an easy fix
The two-week lockdown has the same problem as Labour’s general Covid-19 strategy: it leaves the party backing partial measures.
By Letter of the week: Image of hope for Yemen
A selection of the best letters received from our readers this week. Email [email protected] to have your thoughts voiced…
By Leader: Lessons from the plague year
In the UK, Covid-19 has interacted with pre-existing medical and social ills to lethal effect. We cannot cure them by simply…
By