Peter Hitchens lived in Moscow from June 1990 to October 1992. He is a columnist for the Mail on Sunday.
Even Horace Rumpole could not have secured an acquittal for Lucy Letby. The more I look at this case, the more I suspect that there could never have been any other outcome than a conviction. I think a great cloud of emotion hung over that courtroom during the whole trial. I think that cloud spread
This is about something that did not happen to me at school, an exam I dreaded, but never had to take. It was the only examination that ever really worried me, and it was called Common Entrance. Do not confuse it with modern imitations bearing the same name. In those days, preparing for it involved
31 min listen
On this week’s episode, Peter Hitchens remembers a Christmas in Bucharest, Lionel Shriver says people don’t care about Ukraine anymore, Ed West wonders if you can ‘meme’ yourself into believing in God, Mary Wellesley reads her ‘Notes On’ St Nicholas, and Melissa Kite says she had to move to Ireland to escape the EU‘s rules.
It was on Christmas morning in Moscow in 1990 that my daughter, then aged seven, realised that Santa Claus was not to be trusted. She had made the usual elaborate suggestions to him in a letter to Lapland (perhaps hoping that, being posted from a frozen region, it would get through more readily). But when
I never intended to spend Christmas 1989 on a short break in Bucharest. I had enjoyed a long, thrilling autumn in dark, sad cities in eastern Europe, running and marching with ecstatic crowds as they overthrew communism. But this had all been in the calmer, less exotic regions of the Warsaw Pact, where dumplings were
20 min listen
This week: David Swift looks at whether hope remains in Jaffa, Isreal (00:51); Mary Wakefield on the civil service’s ‘say my name’ campaign (06:49) and Peter Hitchens on his time in prison (13:17).
I confess I never expected to see myself going to the lavatory on prime-time national TV. In fact, the expedition was a failure. Sharing a cell, especially with a young man with a record for GBH, is a very constipating experience. But when I accepted Shine TV’s proposal that I should submit to living alongside
It is high summer but in the early mornings you can already sense the first thrilling signs of autumn, the perfect reading season. What a good moment to revisit the enjoyably cruel England of Simon Raven, as described in his matchless series of novels Alms for Oblivion. It is pagan, unjust, beautiful, funny and evocative.
25 min listen
This episode of Spectator Out Loud features Katy Balls on the new divisions within the Labour Party and what Jeremy Corbyn might run for next (01:08); Peter Hitchens describes the joys of cycling and his dislike of e-bikes and scooters (07:40); and Anthony Horowitz joins us from Crete where he ponders the end of the
An impossible 45 years ago, I decided the moment had come to get back on my pushbike. I had long hated the way the motor car was taking over the world and wanted to play my part in changing this. I also had a more selfish reason. After two years on the Fleet Street diet
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On this special Saturday edition of Coffee House Shots, The Spectator’s James Heale, journalist Peter Hitchens and the IEA’s Christopher Snowdon argue the cases for and against daylight saving time. Are we all being needlessly robbed of an hour in bed? Or should we lighten up and embrace the longer days? Produced by Natasha Feroze
65 min listen
Welcome to the special Christmas episode of The Edition! Up first: What a year in politics it has been. 2022 has seen five education secretaries, four chancellors, three prime ministers and two monarchs. But there is only one political team that can make sense of it all. The Spectator’s editor Fraser Nelson, deputy political editor Katy Balls
I love a good hard debate, especially at a university. I can’t recall how many such clashes I have had, on God, free speech, marijuana, and Russia. But on the subject I really want to talk about, the destruction of the grammar schools, I find it harder and harder to get anyone to debate against
Since I took the Golden Arrow to Paris and back in 1965, I have always thought of that train journey as one of the great joys of life. I cannot remember how many pre–tunnel trips to the City of Light I made, via Dover and Calais, Folkestone and Boulogne or (best of all) Newhaven and
BBC Four announced this morning that ‘The Roads to Freedom’ will play on the BBC for the first time since the 1970s on Wednesday 27 July. In May, Peter Hitchens asked why the BBC had kept it in the archive… If someone had managed to bottle the essence of the 1960s – the exciting, adventurous bits
We were allowed one phone call, faint and crackling along the many miles of copper wire which connected Hampshire with Dartmoor. In those days (this was the early 1960s) the operator had to connect it. I had watched those wires, swooping alongside the train which had borne me all that way, wisps of smoke and
55 min listen
On this week’s very special Christmas episode, we’ll hear from Lara Prendergast on why she’s planning to party hard this Christmas. (00:57) Next, Christopher Howse on those helping to preserve the UK’s medieval churches. (06:31) Then it’s, Lionel Shriver on the Covid heretics she admires most. (16:41) Followed by, Peter Hitchens on Christmas in Russia during
22 min listen
On this week’s episode, we’ll hear from Douglas Murray on the political fate of US vice president Kamala Harris. (00:58) Next, Mary Wakefield on her experience during storm Arwen and subsequent media coverage. (09:39) And finally, Peter Hitchens on his fears regarding the future of the city of Oxford. (15:58) Produced and presented by Sam
Only a dictator can save Oxford now. Local government simply cannot grasp how precious this marvellous, unrivalled city is, and how easy it will be to erode it into bare, dispiriting bleakness and ugliness. Any fool can see that the ancient colleges of the university must be preserved, but the setting in which they stand
Rod Liddle once actually said to me the immortal words ‘You were right and I was wrong’ at a Spectator summer party. This is a moment I shall treasure till the hour of my death. But even so, I was disappointed. For the subject was only Theresa May. I had predicted she would be a
