“Every morning I tell myself, Today has to be productive—and then something happens that prevents me from writing. Today . . . what is...

One of the most luminous, most humane intelligences in history was born two hundred years ago today: But the effect of her being on those...

Reading all the depressing news about plastic, which has now found its way to the bottom of the Marianas Trench – I’m reminded again of a...

Why is English so much simpler in grammar and richer in vocabulary than so many other languages? (Why does the OED need twenty volumes?)...

Today the Guardian – or Grauniad, as we lovers of its many typos call it – recommends the lovely Devon village of Tavistock as “not...

Two pictures tell a thousand words. In his recent public appearance, Robert Mueller thought he’d been clear, or as clear as the peculiar...

What with global warming to worry about, and Syria, and the Sixth Extinction, we really shouldn’t be spending any of our attention on...

The brilliant old curmudgeon, Australia’s great Bard of Bunyah, is dead. I found his political, social and religious outlook by turns...

In this article in the Guardian on the subject of famous “Brutalist” buildings under threat from demolition, I note with interest and...

I’ve been reading about a debate over the UK national pension scheme for teachers.  This expression rolls off the British ear unnoticed,...

The characters’ motivations make so little sense that theories abound about missing or garbled text. And some of its faults would be easy...

Antony and Cleopatra in the Olivier at the National Theatre; a bracingly modern techno-thriller with executive suites, machine guns, and...

Over dinner in London, a fascinating discussion is launched by my American friend John A., who has been in-country for months but is...

No surprise that the President has rushed to the aid of Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith, whose campaign in Mississippi has been threatened by a...

The excellent and hugely underrated philosopher Mary Midgley has died at the age of 99, shortly after completing yet another book. (She...

This morning’s Seattle Times sports section has an entire page devoted to Seahawks owner Paul Allen, who died yesterday. The ghastly...

Should you place a hood over the evil Facebook, blast Twitter out of its tree, and rip up all your Instagrams? You really should,...

After so many headlines about the men who  want to turn the world into kindling and warm their hands over the flames (in just this...

As a British writer who has lived in the US for 35 years, I constantly face the problem that I cannot remember which of my Englishes is...

Here are seven favorite quotations from historian Timothy Snyder’s superb short book of the same name: When the men with guns who have...