Michael Moorcock

The hubris of the great airship designers

Rushing to build the world’s largest flying machine was perhaps Britain’s greatest imperial folly, with a disregard for safety measures dooming the R101 to disaster

The R101 was supposed to head a fleet of airships capable of carrying troops and goods to any part of the British Empire [Alamy] 
issue 09 December 2023

  • His Majesty’s Airship: The Life and Tragic Death of the World’s Largest Flying Machine

    S.C. Gwynne

    Oneworld Publications, pp. 300, £25

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The news that Terry Pratchett’s 2002 novel Night Watch has joined the ranks of the Penguin Modern Classics series may seem, to the Pratchett uninitiated, something of an eyebrow-raiser. Penguin has proudly announced that the book ‘which draws on inspirations as far ranging as Victor Hugo and M*A*S*H, is… a profoundly empathetic novel about community, connection and

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