An intelligent mix of culture, style, travel, food and property, as well as where to go and what to see.
It’s the most talked about comeback in France since Charles de Gaulle came out of retirement in 1958. The general may have launched the Fifth Republic, but Céline Dion is limiting herself to ten evenings at the Paris La Défense Arena between September 12 and October 14. Dion is French Canadian, but the French have adopted her as their own, as they did
When so much contemporary art is riven with obscurity and angst, it is disorienting, at first, to encounter something as straightforwardly enjoyable as Hockney’s latest exhibition. Aged 88, the artist went out into his garden in Normandy with his iPad to make a visual diary of the year 2020. A hundred or so of the
Nostalgia is often seen as a positive emotion, but the word actually derives from the Greek nostos, meaning “homecoming,” and algos, meaning “pain.” Nostalgia is really a type of homesickness, an ache for something lost. As audiences watch the new trailer for the HBO Harry Potter television series, the algos may hit pretty hard: those tantalizing two minutes are the reminder we need that you can’t catch lightning in a bottle twice.
The German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860) once wrote that “the man who feels himself drawn to philosophy must himself seek out its immortal teachers in the quiet sanctuary of their works.” That’s easier said than done: philosophical classics have a terrible reputation outside ivory towers – as big, boring, difficult books, filled with obtuse theorizing about irrelevant problems, their covers featuring ghastly
I almost spat out my toast (smothered with the As Ever, The Raspberry Spread Trio – “Made To Keep On Hand And Enjoy Often,” $42 – naturally) in pure molten anticipation when I read that my role model in spreading jam to flour, sorry, speaking truth to power, will be hosting a women-only weekend “retreat” in Sydney during her forthcoming
Did Mariah Carey mime or not when she headlined the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympics in Milan? That was the main takeaway from last month’s jamboree. Organizers have since suggested that the US singer did indeed lip-sync to Domenico Modugno’s “Nel Blu, dipinto di Blu” and the song that followed, her very own, “Nothing is Impossible.” “The technical, logistical and organizational complexities of an Olympic ceremony
The semiotics of clothes, especially royal ones, can be fascinating, sending out powerful messages. Think of the jewel-studded, pearl-strewn portraits of Queen Elizabeth I or Princess Diana’s revenge-chic black dress. As a fashion queen herself (Justine Picardie was editor-in-chief of Harper’s Bazaar for more than seven years and has an acclaimed book on Chanel under
This St. David’s Day weekend, I devote this column to a celebration of the world’s most under-appreciated ethnic group. Under-appreciated, certainly, in the pages of The Spectator, whose editorial policy suffers from a Pictish delusion that its readers are eager to hear of the appointment of a new procurator fiscal in Ayrshire, or political divides
There’s a trend on YouTube at the moment for videos in which older people give advice. They speak directly to camera, frankly and without pretension. One can almost sense the care home staff hovering in the background, coaxing their barely extant charges into making one last testament of their time on Earth. The videos have titles such as “Things I’d
It was the sort of elaborate birthday surprise that Andrew – practical joker and fond of a fart gag – might have arranged to prank a friend. Six unmarked police cars roaring up to the farmhouse where he had been living on the Sandringham estate at the unseemly hour of 8 a.m yesterday. Only these
In recent months, much has been made of “FAFO parenting.” Touted as the backlash to “gentle parenting,” the philosophy of “Fuck Around & Find Out” seems to be that children should learn the natural consequences of poor decision-making. While gentle parenting advocates empathy and respect, reasoning and explanation, FAFO parenting dictates that rather than going nine rounds with your small person to
I’ve been fat and I’ve been thin; I’ve been pretty and I’ve been plain – ugly, even. Throughout this, my self-esteem has stayed generally constant, as if you’re going to base it on something as ephemeral as physical beauty, you’re going to run out of road very quickly indeed. This objective attitude to my own
28 Years Later, Danny Boyle’s ace return to the 28 Days later series, was one of last year’s most pleasant cinematic surprises. Combining serious thrills with creeping suspense and a light dusting of social commentary, it also ended with one hell of a cliffhanger, as its protagonist, Alfie Williams’s young Spike, found himself in the
Welcome to the People’s Republic of Santa Monica
The good news about these execrable awards shows is that they tend to expose who these people are in real life
It’s almost beyond belief that the state used to be a glorious paradise of tennis-playing, churchgoing, hard-working patriotic Republicans
