Europe

The existential crisis facing Labour is one shared by its sister parties across the continent As the UK’s Labour Party comes to terms with its latest failure to connect with the electorate it can at least comfort itself with one thing: it is not alone. Traditional social democratic and Labour parties across Western Europe are reeling from a […]

The German village of Wakendorf II, population 1428, was covered in a wave of liquid manure after the seal on a farm silo burst. Locals said there was a “bestial” smell after the 230,000-litre holding tank, on a farm overlooking the village in Schleswig-Holstein, emptied its contents at 11am last Saturday.  Christopher Möller, 22, said […]

Richard Hamilton eschewed the knockabout nature of other purveyors of Pop Art, says Richard Holledge, but his work packed just as much of a punch. Pop! Whaam! Blam. Exclamation marks!!! Technicolour explosions. That’s Pop Art for you. The comic book whizz-bangs of Roy Lichtenstein and a group of post-war artists typified the 1960s for many – […]

Colour was always at the core of Wassily Kandinsky’s art. Claudia Pritchard reports on a stunning exhibition which traces his creative journey as he was shifted around Europe by the events of the early 20th century The career path from lawyer to artist is not often taken. Tchaikovsky managed to duck out of jurisprudence and […]

Denis MacShane on the late Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, a man who helped modernise France and Europe, and relished an argument and a rivalry. “Your friend, Tony Blair, who does he think he is. He’s now calling for Albania to be let into Europe?” Valéry Giscard d’Estaing stretched out his long legs in the French embassy in […]

Lech Walesa helped create modern Poland. Thirty years after he came to power, MICK O’HARE reports on a complex character and his even more complex legacy When Poland’s ruling Law and Justice party was re-elected in October 2019 under prime minister Mateusz Morawiecki it was on a ticket of more of the same. More right-wing […]

Jason Solomons finds actor Viggo Mortensen in characteristically ebullient mood in their over-running Zoom catch-up. Although still best-known to audiences as heroic Aragorn in the Lord of the Rings films, actor Viggo Mortensen has a reputation in the business as cinema’s Renaissance Man. He acts, writes poetry, composes music, sings, paints, runs a publishing imprint, […]

CHARLIE CONNELLY on Rene Goscinny, the French comic editor and writer, who co-created the Astérix comic book series. On January 20 this year a statue was unveiled in Paris on a patch of grass near the junction of Rue de Boulainvilliers and Rue Singer. It’s unassuming, some might say underwhelming: a podgy middle-aged man in […]

PETER TRUDGILL on the likeliest roots of perhaps the world’s most used word. OK is one of the most successful English words of all time. It is a relatively new word – the first recorded usage dates from the mid-1800s – but it has now spread to all varieties of English around the world, and […]

Tim Walker on how online is not what theatre should ever be about. The great theatre impresario Bill Kenwright used to get cross with critics who, having requested two tickets for an opening night, showed up on their tod. On such occasions, he took empty seats as an insult and understandably so. I thought about […]

SOPHIA DEBOICK on the Minnesotan city and its most famous musical son. Minneapolis has always taken its own path. When Bob Dylan arrived in the city in 1959 from Duluth, 150 miles further north, he discovered that Minneapolis – the ‘City of Lakes’ – and its twin city Saint Paul were “rock and roll towns” […]

The Tate Modern and three US galleries have postponed a major exhibition of Philip Guston’s work, alarmed at his depictions of the Ku Klux Klan. Claudia Pritchard reports on a raging art controversy. In November 1970, the American avant-garde composer Morton Feldman went to see his artist friend Philip Guston’s new exhibition at the Marlborough […]

Globalisation might now be a dirty word for many, while U2 sometimes seem as disliked by an equal number. But, says IAN WALKER, at their finest the band capture a sense of optimism about the connected world. Commercially, U2 are as successful as any band could be. Over the last decade, they made more money […]

Labour has long been seen as a party of factions, while the Tories just had ‘tendencies’. But, asks TIM BALE, are the Conservatives now also splintering?  ‘You’re joking. Not another one!’ – not just Brenda from Bristol in the spring of 2017, reacting to Theresa May calling a snap election, but also Tim Bale (whose […]

In a deeply personal essay, writer PETER GUMBEL explains how the waning of national identities, combined with Brexit, has led him to reassess his own sense of who he is. November 9 is a day heavy with significance for my family: on that date in 1938, my maternal grandfather was arrested in his German hometown […]

European Union MEP Guy Verhofstadt has claimed that Brexiteers have been “served a slice of humble pie” after a statement from the EU said it will continue to stand up for the interests of the bloc.  The Belgian politician was keen to make his point that those against the EU have failed to divide the organisation […]

The city has been so scrutinised it is difficult to find much more new to say about it. But an enthralling new book has succeeded in this task, says CHARLIE CONNELLY. The early days of the coronavirus seem a long time ago now. Streets fell empty as we hunkered down, shops and businesses closed and […]

Nine writers from across the continent tell us what ‘Europe’ means to them… Ana Pessoa, Portuguese authorEurope is about multilingualism and multiculturalism. We might not speak the same language, we might not share the same cultural background. Perhaps we don’t laugh at the same jokes even and we live very different lives. But we share […]

New data shows significant increases in apathy towards Covid-19 across Europe, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO). Fatigue has been measured in different ways across 27 countries but “is now estimated to have reached over 60%” of the population in some places, said WHO regional director for Europe Dr Hans Kluge. Dr Kluge set […]

Europeans have idealised their continent as a place of accomplishment and civilisation, of excellence and enlightenment. But, in a challenging essay, Surinamese-Dutch writer GLORIA WEKKER argues that there is another side to Europe, of exclusion and denial. One evening in the dead of winter 2015, close to zero degrees and with a cold wind searching […]

The Swiss held two important national referendums last Sunday. The first decisively reversed a previous one of 2014 which, by a wafer-thin majority, had sought to end freedom of movement of people with the EU, putting the country’s whole relationship with Europe in jeopardy. The lesson for Brexit Britain, a Swiss friend tells me, is […]

A year ago, monitoring the G7 protests in Biarritz, I was kettled for more than two hours by police under a baking sun. The following day, I was almost choked by tear gas in Bayonne. What I experienced in the southwest of France was part of a heavy-handed police and judicial response to peaceful protest […]

The European Commission has put tackling discrimination at the heart of its mission. That will mean tougher and more frequent clashes with some member states, says Piotr Godzisz. In her first state of the union address as president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen called out hatred and pledged to build “a union […]