Notebooks

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Nixon’s dance with the chairman

In February 1972, President Richard Nixon landed in China for a meeting that would set the stage for over fifty years of both economic integration and political antagonism.

Elisabeth Braw February 21, 2024

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The most dangerous of short stories

As it turns 100, the influence of Richard Connell’s tale of man hunting man remains undimmed.

Thomas W. Hodgkinson February 21, 2024

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The founding father of a future Russia

Alexei Navalny represented a new generation of Russians who understand the unsustainability of Putinism and its corrupt leadership.

Gregory Feifer February 20, 2024

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Sharpest of historians

The early-modern historian James Sharpe was a man of many achievements, including the finest microhistory produced from English sources.

David Wootton February 19, 2024

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Navalny’s end

Today’s Russia is not Stalin’s Soviet Union, but it is certainly a place where you may end up dead if you defy the authorities. 

Rodric Braithwaite February 16, 2024

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Kafka’s goodbye to Berlin

Franz Kafka found peace in the German capital. It wasn't to last long.

Malcolm Forbes February 15, 2024

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Going it alone

It is the tension between lived experience and potentially thrilling dramatic invention that makes the one-person show such a potent and electrifying means of entertainment.

Alexander Larman February 14, 2024

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All hail the mandarin collar

The mandarin collar proves that simplicity really is the ultimate form of sophistication. It is to men’s fashion what Hemingway’s prose is to literature: lean, spare, lethally effi..

Theo Zenou February 12, 2024

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Why Zelenskyy fired Zaluzhnyi

The Ukrainian president will be hoping that just as his selection of Valerii Zaluzhnyi as commander-in-chief in 2021 helped save Ukraine in 2022, the selection of Oleksandr Syrskyi..

Mick Ryan February 9, 2024