The summer dying season is now well under way in the Mediterranean, with news of yet another tragedy at sea as desperate people try to reach Europe still able to shock, if not surprise.
Some have called it the “pause”, others the “hiatus”. Now it seems neither description is accurate, given that the three hottest years on record have all occurred in the last five years and that nine out of the ten hottest years have all been in this century.
Dina Asher-Smith turned from history student to history maker as she broke the 31-year-old British record for the 200 metres and became the fastest teenager ever over the distance in Beijing on Friday.
This was supposed to be a family affair for Tiffany Porter and Cindy Ofili, two sisters side by side bidding for a medal, but it ended with one sibling sitting in the stands, the other somersaulting dramatically over the finishing line of the 100m hurdles.
It was a combination of agony and ecstasy for Shara Proctor as she came within a solitary long jump of winning Britain’s fourth gold of the World Championships.
The recent appointments to the House of Lords highlight the complete lack of momentum for reform of the Second House. A good start would be to remove all the trappings and titles of nobility, since hereditary dukes, earls and the rest no longer have the birthright of a Lords seat.
Just back from speaking at the Edinburgh Book Festival, where the audiences surpass all others for intelligence. Quick, shrewd, funny, responsive, learned, sceptical, appreciative, mature – but not so mature that you worry they won’t survive the hour – generous with their applause and eager to buy multiple copies of your novel afterwards. An audience, in short, from book heaven.
Just when middle-class people thought they were safe. Just when they thought they had found a socially acceptable chain restaurant that serves hummus in pots, burgers on boards and good-value minute steaks by candlelight, it has all gone horribly wrong.
Earlier this month, the BBC’s Newsnight programme broadcast at length and in detail the lynching of a young woman by more than 100 enraged men who beat, kicked, ran over, stoned and burnt their victim while police stood by. It was right to do so. True, Newsnight suppressed the mob’s final assault on 27-year-old Farkhunda Malikzada, a student of Islamic law falsely accused in Kabul of burning a Koran. Still, the camera lingered unbearably longer than it usually does. Made with tact and courage by Zarghuna Kargar... Читать дальше...
A new series of Blackadder? I’ll be giving it a miss. Ditto any revival of the popular drama series Cold Feet, which ITV is said to be considering to perk up our Sunday evenings when Downton Abbey finally ends this Christmas. Our popular culture is suffering from a crippling disease, one that suffocates creativity and consigns us to second-division status: nostalgia.
The Edinburgh Festival acts as a showcase for the country’s best joke-tellers. Here, Alice Jones picks 50 of her 2015 favourites:
There is a great irony where Isis is concerned. While the group claim to be creating a new society in which race and nationality don’t matter (as long as you agree with the Isis party line) – we know that the truth is actually very different.
So much progress has been made on colour-blind casting in recent years, that I wasn’t sure the concept would ever be an issue again. Of course, there are issues over how fast the progress is and the numbers involved, and such people as Sir Lenny Henry keep these aspects in the public debate. But the concept itself is by now beyond argument. Or so I thought.
The cameraman who sensationally knocked down Usain Bolt while on a Segway after the Jamaican's 200m triumph yesterday has spoken for the first time since the dramatic incident, and has given Bolt a good luck charm to wear on his wrist as his way of apology.
David Cameron’s handing of 26 peerages to political cronies is an embarrassment and makes the need for House of Lords reform even more crucial than it was before.
Can the pensioner with the grey beard win the grey vote? If, as I expect, 66-year-old Jeremy Corbyn wins the Labour leadership on 12 September, this could be the crucial question at the 2020 general election, rather than his plans to tax the rich or take the rail and energy companies back into state control.
Before making the leap into pet ownership, there are several points to bear in mind, including how much time you have, the financial commitment, what accommodation you have and how long individual pets can live
It’s pretty difficult to cast our minds back to the time when Robin Thicke was pop’s golden boy, before people actually read the lyrics to monster hit ‘Blurred Lines’ and pointed that there were some distinctly rapey (there’s really no other word) undertones. Long before the multi-million pound court battle over whether or not the song was plagiarised from Motown legend Marvin Gaye and the embarrassing on-stage begging to try win back ex-wife Paula Patton, Thicke was the star of 2013.
At last week's Edinburgh TV Festival, we were treated to a full-throated defence of the BBC from writer Armando Iannucci, backed by BBC Director of TV Danny Cohen with his usual peevish batting off of any criticism of the Corporation. The stout resistance to the barbarians at the gate is all very laudable, and to be expected when the Conservative government has the BBC in the crosshairs. But BBC bosses still expect licence fee payers to drink the Kool Aid while ignoring the vast elephant in the room ... Читать дальше...
Just how bad does the migrant crisis have to get before the European Union’s political leaders start showing some leadership?
“Gutted for the Exclusive Escapes team & its clients - a truly great little company that always went the extra mile.” So tweeted Julia Spence, a PR specialist, after the Richmond-based upmarket holiday firm ceased trading.
Alison Parker and Andrew Ward were gunned down doing a routine piece for their local news station on Wednesday morning. The murder was carried out by former co-worker Vester Flanagan, whose convoluted motive appears to land somewhere between HR grievance and racial hatred. But I don’t need to tell you all of this – chances are, you’ve already seen it first-hand.
If you go to a ballet that tells a story, chances are that you will see a fairy tale, a pastoral idyll, or one of an apparently endless stream of different Alice in Wonderlands. Dance does offer meatier dramas – Romeo and Juliet, Manon or Mayerling, for instance – but there is undoubtedly room for more, and especially for work that tackles gritty contemporary classics.
With the Chinese economic miracle coming to an end, as shown by "Black Monday" and the devaluation of the renminbi, one can feel a sense of relief in the West about this unexpected turn of events. After all, most predictions indicated the Chinese economy would be able to overtake the US economy in the years to come. Political power would soon follow – the Chinese would "rule the world", as some experts predicted. They would "buy up Europe", the think-tank ECFR argued, after having already gobbled up chunks of Africa. Читать дальше...
No longer a remote outpost, Western Australia's sun-soaked capital buzzes with creativity and it's about to come into bloom