Arts and Culture

While European sounds veered towards the melancholy, and often morose, America was tuning in to something far more effervescent. SOPHIA DEBOICK reports. The Victorian age was being left behind, but in 1904 the western world was still torn between civilized modernity and brutal primitivism. It was the era of the New Imperialism, and April’s Entente […]

His musical talent and passion might have been overshadowed by other elements of his reign, but Henry VIII deserves his reputation as a king with an ear for a tune, says SOPHIA DEBOICK Henry VIII is known as a musician monarch, but it is a characterisation based on a song he almost certainly didn’t write. […]

Almost by chance, CHARLIE CONNELLY finds himself engrossed in a timely novel set in a Paris beset by rising floods. Most of the books featured in these pages I buy myself. I hear about them, I buy them, I write about them. I’m also sent review copies of forthcoming books and if the right book […]

Still life may lack the drama and passion of other forms of art. But, as CLAUDIA PRITCHARD discovers at an exhibition of one of its great proponents, it is no less intense Battle scenes, expansive nudes, eye-popping abstracts and ravishing views compete in the art gallery to catch the eye, with their scale of ambition, […]

While the charts were filled with much that was bland, 1948’s standout hits displayed technical innovation and an inspired slice of weirdness. NEW YORK – CIRCA 1949: Singer Patti Page poses for a portrait circa 1949 in New York City, New York (Photo by James Kriegsmann/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images) – Credit: Archant The war may […]

The story of how a little corner of Wales retains a very English flavour. If you look at a map of Wales, you will see that the majority of the places in the country bear unmistakably Welsh-language names: Aberystwyth, Caernarfon, Ffestiniog, Llanelli, Machynlleth, Pwllheli, Ystradgynlais. Certainly no one would ever suppose that Llanrhaeadr-ym-Mochnant was somewhere […]

Of two major new exhibitions dedicated to Vincent Van Gogh, one focuses on the artists he admired at the beginning of his career, while the other looks at an artist who looked up to him. With its neat fields and slender trees that pierce a heavy sky, a single picture plays a pivotal role in […]

As a new initiative to encourage the reading of fast fiction is launched, CHARLIE CONNELLY sings the praises of short-form literature. ‘For sale: baby shoes, never worn’ is the famous response attributed to Ernest Hemingway when challenged to write an entire story in six words. This was the ultimate short story and the quickest of […]

Come rain or shine, CHARLIE CONNELLY has swum in the Channel every day since last summer. He explains how it can boost your energy and self-esteem. If you look closely at the photograph above, you’ll see that between the frost-covered shingle and those majestic massing clouds there’s a tiny speck of a person. That person […]

CHARLIE CONNELLY on a reissued classic that celebrates wanderlust and everything that Brexit seeks to deprive us of. Of all the rage-inducing aspects of the last three years, two comments above all continue to have me grinding my teeth and occasionally waking up shouting in the middle of the night. Both of them came from […]

A vintage year for the industry saw the most No.1s ever, as attempts to greet the new millennium with gravitas fell flat. SOPHIA DEBOICK reports. The Millennium Dome summed up the pricked pomposity of the year 2000. Tony Blair called it ‘a triumph of confidence over cynicism, boldness over blandness, excellence over mediocrity’. In the […]

PETER TRUDGILL explains the processes by which phrases can contract to just a shadow of their former selves. It is often the fate of words and phrases, over the millennia, to get shorter and shorter. The Latin phrase hoc die, ‘this day’, famously became so shortened in French – as hui, ‘today’ – that French […]

JASON SOLOMONS on a new film about the remarkable life of Bert Trautmann, the former German paratrooper who became a British hero. Trautmann, Bernhard. Picture: Schirner/ullstein bild via Getty Images – Credit: ullstein bild via Getty Images If you’ve heard of Bert Trautmann, it’s perhaps more as the answer to a football trivia question than […]

Dorothea Tanning was a rare female protagonist of surrealism and bridged many art disciplines and movements. A new exhibition pays due tribute to this pioneer, says CLAUDIA PRITCHARD. One door opens and another door opens in both the life and the art of Dorothea Tanning. A surrealist painter and sculptor, designer and writer, in her […]

JASON SOLOMONS on a new book which captures – and cherishes – the idiosyncrasies and occasional flaws of the capital. London is the best city in the world. As soon as you surrender to this indisputable fact, then you can set sail on the tide of emotion and information that swells through a new book, […]

Britain – as ever – focused on the twin fascinations of sex and scandal. And did so with a glorious abundance of fun and frivolity. SOPHIA DEBOICK reports Actress, dancer and singer Lottie Collins (1866 – 1910) curtseying. She is famous for the song ‘Ta Ra Ra Boom De Ay!’ Photo by London Stereoscopic Company/Getty […]

The rising popularity of translated fiction shows we remain a country keen to look and learn beyond our shores, says Charlie Connelly. I bring a glimmer of hope. It is just a glimmer, a small one, and perhaps one in the manner of the email I received from a cross-channel ferry company last week announcing […]

Much remains unclear about the nature of the music produced by the Romans. But, as SOPHIA DEBOICK reports, by piecing together the clues, their creativity can still be heard. After the ravages of the Great Fire of Rome, the reign of Nero, multiple civil wars and the disasters at Pompeii and Herculaneum the previous year, […]

Singers started to unbutton, and America got a taste for adultery. SOPHIA DEBOICK on a saucy year in music (Eingeschr�nkte Rechte f�r bestimmte redaktionelle Kunden in Deutschland. Limited rights for specific editorial clients in Germany.) Bleriot, Louis – Engineer, Aviator, F *01.07.1872-02.08.1936+ Betheny near Reims: Louis Bleriot during a flight, befor his accident – ca. […]

It has its diehard fans, but do we really need this punctuation mark, asks PETER TRUDGILL The English word apostrophe comes from a Greek term meaning ‘turning away’: in Modern Greek apó means ‘from’ and strophí is ‘turn’. As used in English, apostrophe refers to the usage of the punctuation mark ‘ to indicate the […]

The author of Das Boot would have hated the new TV adaptation – but he hated most things. CHARLIE CONNELLY on the troubled mind which could never escape the terror of war beneath the waves. Lizzy Caplan as Carla Monroe in Das Boot, 2018. PHOTO: IMDB – Credit: Archant One morning in the spring of […]

Ahead of tonight’s star-studded ceremony, critic Jason Solomons watches the remarkable Oscar-nominated film looking back on a long-forgotten episode in American history. The group’s leader, Fritz Julius Kuhn, addressed the 20,000 people in attendance. Picture: Getty Images – Credit: Bettmann Archive In February 1939, the month that German Jews were forced to turn over any […]

The year when music came with a sense of optimism, Orientalism – and often surrealism – as pharaohs and fruit provided the inspiration. NEW YORK – CIRCA 1925: Blues singer Bessie Smith poses for a portrait circa 1925 in New York City, New York. (Photo by Edward Elcha/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images) – Credit: Archant America […]

The Olympic year represented a high point for a self-confident and outward-looking United Kingdom, says Sophia Deboick. Psy performs at the Washington DC Jingle Ball concert at the Patriot Center in Fairfax, Virginia in 2012. Picture: ABACA/Press Association Images – Credit: ABACA/Press Association Images Britain felt like a truly hopeful place in 2012. We were […]

PETER TRUDGILL on what lies behind our irregular everyday phrases. The most usual way to make past-tense verb forms in English is to add -ed to the basic form of the verb: want–wanted, love–loved; play–played. So why is the past tense of go not goed but went? Even with verbs which are irregular and do […]

Loathed by Picasso, praised by Matisse, Pierre Bonnard is an artist who split opinion, writes Claudia Pritchard. A major new exhibition of his work shows how he still does. Nude in the Bath c. 1936-8, by Pierre Bonnard Picture: Tate – Credit: Archant ‘Don’t talk to me about Bonnard,’ protested Picasso around the time of […]

As the Second World War took shape, a big band leader dominated the year. While, from very different quarters, a Disney film and an emerging folk star signalled sounds of the future.SOPHIA DEBOICK reports. The year began with a sense of foreboding. Four months on from the Nazi invasion of Poland, Britain faced the start […]

Why does the death of a footballer produce such a particular and profound sense of pathos? asks CHARLIE CONNELLY When the aircraft intending to carry 28-year-old Argentinean footballer Emiliano Sala from Nantes to Cardiff disappeared over the English Channel north of Alderney, shock and bewilderment spread throughout the football world. In Nantes, the Breton city […]

As the Romani brought a gypsy beat from the east, Europe’s greatest musical innovator, Hildegard of Bingen, found a sound that could examine the human condition, as much as praise God. SOPHIA DEBOICK reports. Not even a century on from the Norman conquest, 1150 found England in the grip of political crisis. Henry I had […]

As a hit new documentary provides Bros with an unlikely comeback, SOPHIA DEBOICK looks back to the eccentric twins’ first embrace 
of fame Tiffany, wearing a black hat and her hand placed on her cheek. (Photo by Lynn Goldsmith/Corbis/VCG via Getty Images) – Credit: Corbis/VCG via Getty Images For Britain, 1988 was a manic year. […]

This week marks the 80th anniversary of the mysterious death of the sublimely-talented footballer Matthias Sindelar. CHARLIE CONNELLY revisits the tragic story of a true Austrian hero National hero: Matthias Sindelar’s image was used to market watches, milk and yogurt. Photo submitted – Credit: Archant Vienna has always had a strong fascination with death. In […]

PETER TRUDGILL on how some unlikely connections between European languages emerged after 2,000 years The Albanian word for king is mbret. You might think that this has got nothing to do with any word in any language that you have ever come across before. But it would be slightly surprising if you were right. Albanian […]