Reviews

Review

Everything is not really okay in Afghanistan

Hassan Abbas’ portrayal of the Taliban’s first year in power tracks the difficult transition from insurgent group to cabinet government, and argues for engagement for the sake of t..

Suzanne Raine June 2, 2023

Review

Highs and lows

A trio of new productions of operatic masterpieces suggests that less is more.

Paul Lay June 1, 2023

Review

In defence of the literary critic

Literary criticism is casting off its stultifying, exclusionary shackles. Its redefinition as something more personal meets the reader on equal terms in a quietly defiant act.

Charlotte Stroud May 25, 2023

Review

The British Empire: a Very English Perspective

An explicitly ‘progressive’ survey of nascent British imperialism buckles under the weight of its contradictions.

Samuel Rubinstein May 15, 2023

Review

Religion v Science: Crossing the Great Divide

This grand historical survey, running from the classical world to the quantum age, is an impressively erudite and admirably even-handed account of the entanglements of religion and..

Christopher Harding May 11, 2023

Review

The World Was Not Ready for Hilma af Klint

Hilma af Klint's rightful place is at the heart of the art historical canon.

David Lomas May 4, 2023

Review

Championing Opera’s Next Generation

The Met's ‘edgy’ new season is anything but. It needs to look elsewhere if it is to revive this most dramatic of musical genres.

Gerald Malone April 25, 2023

Review

Russia’s Scramble for Africa

Intensified activity across the African continent is part of Russia's quest to construct a multipolar world.

Andrew Monaghan April 21, 2023

Review

On the Road with Alexis de Tocqueville

Without Tocqueville the traveller, Tocqueville the sage of democracy is difficult to conceive of at all.

Samuel Gregg April 13, 2023