The Choral — Nicholas Hytner’s film of Alan Bennett’s screenplay — is worth 103 minutes of anyone’s time, even if, in many ways, it’s not very good. In a Yorkshire mill town in 1916 the local choral society has already lost most of its men to the Western front. When
“You who are seated here today will be China’s elites tomorrow,” declared the middle-aged party secretary at my senior high school. Alongside hundreds of other first-year students at one of the top schools in the province, I was stunned by the over-the-top welcome speech. The other pronouncement of this party
“Your Excellency, we find the Australian constitution a puzzling document and would appreciate your clarification,” said Kazakhstan’s president Nursultan Nazarbayev. “I would be most obliged if you would set out for me what powers it confers on you.” Nazarbayev’s guest was the Australian governor-general Bill Hayden. It was April 1994,
For almost a decade, we — a Muslim and a Jew — have worked side by side, in partnership and trust, to strengthen social cohesion in Australia. Our relationship was not forged in abstraction or agreement on everything, but through shared work, shared risk and a steady belief that difference,
Sarah Stein Lubrano wants to fathom the mess we’re in and help us navigate a way out of it. Her provocatively titled debut, Don’t Talk About Politics: How to Change 21st-Century Minds, contends that “trust in society and interest in politics have hit a nadir” in Western democracies. The reason:
Five genre-bending drama series made keenly anticipated returns to television this year, all of them meeting expectations convincingly enough to ensure a further season. Clearing the hurdle for renewal is a tougher challenge than ever. With risk-averse investors punting on what they assume to be tried and tested recipes for
In early October, Britain’s justice secretary and deputy prime minister David Lammy was booed and jeered when he attended a vigil for victims of an attack on a Manchester synagogue the day before. One British Jew had been murdered and police, in the confusion, had shot and killed another, as well
Allies, friends and clients of the United States grasp at a three-tier strategy to deal with a rogue American president running an incoherent government. The first tier is hold on hard, so as to cope with a bumpy ride while clinging to as much as possible in the US relationship.
Sean Kelly’s Quarterly Essay The Good Fight: What Does Labor Stand For? is a passionate cri de couer from a Labor true believer. Kelly fears the Albanese government is missing a major opportunity to deliver meaningful change. His central question is not just what Labor stands for but what it
Last summer, a few American writer friends and I travelled across China on a self-organised tour of AI labs, factories and industrial clusters. Among them was Aadil, a twenty-two-year-old Bay Area engineer who loves the Cantonese rapper SKAI ISYOURGOD and deploys Chinese memes with the fluency of someone raised on
In the twelve months since he was elected for a second term, Donald Trump has driven an agenda more damaging to American democracy, rights, freedoms and international reputation than could have been predicted by even the most far-sighted political analyst. Where is the political opposition to citizens being snatched off
Since 2006, the Economist Intelligence Unit has measured the quality of democracy in 167 countries and territories across the world. Its last index, for 2024, was published in February. Over the past eighteen years, the average score has declined — both globally and for each of the world’s regions —
The Choral — Nicholas Hytner’s film of Alan Bennett’s screenplay — is worth 103 minutes of anyone’s time, even if, in many ways, it’s not very good. In a Yorkshire mill town in 1916 the local choral society has already lost most of its men to the Western front. When
“You who are seated here today will be China’s elites tomorrow,” declared the middle-aged party secretary at my senior high school. Alongside hundreds of other first-year students at one of the top schools in the province, I was stunned by the over-the-top welcome speech. The other pronouncement of this party
“Your Excellency, we find the Australian constitution a puzzling document and would appreciate your clarification,” said Kazakhstan’s president Nursultan Nazarbayev. “I would be most obliged if you would set out for me what powers it confers on you.” Nazarbayev’s guest was the Australian governor-general Bill Hayden. It was April 1994,
For almost a decade, we — a Muslim and a Jew — have worked side by side, in partnership and trust, to strengthen social cohesion in Australia. Our relationship was not forged in abstraction or agreement on everything, but through shared work, shared risk and a steady belief that difference,
Sarah Stein Lubrano wants to fathom the mess we’re in and help us navigate a way out of it. Her provocatively titled debut, Don’t Talk About Politics: How to Change 21st-Century Minds, contends that “trust in society and interest in politics have hit a nadir” in Western democracies. The reason:
Five genre-bending drama series made keenly anticipated returns to television this year, all of them meeting expectations convincingly enough to ensure a further season. Clearing the hurdle for renewal is a tougher challenge than ever. With risk-averse investors punting on what they assume to be tried and tested recipes for
In early October, Britain’s justice secretary and deputy prime minister David Lammy was booed and jeered when he attended a vigil for victims of an attack on a Manchester synagogue the day before. One British Jew had been murdered and police, in the confusion, had shot and killed another, as well
Allies, friends and clients of the United States grasp at a three-tier strategy to deal with a rogue American president running an incoherent government. The first tier is hold on hard, so as to cope with a bumpy ride while clinging to as much as possible in the US relationship.
Sean Kelly’s Quarterly Essay The Good Fight: What Does Labor Stand For? is a passionate cri de couer from a Labor true believer. Kelly fears the Albanese government is missing a major opportunity to deliver meaningful change. His central question is not just what Labor stands for but what it
Last summer, a few American writer friends and I travelled across China on a self-organised tour of AI labs, factories and industrial clusters. Among them was Aadil, a twenty-two-year-old Bay Area engineer who loves the Cantonese rapper SKAI ISYOURGOD and deploys Chinese memes with the fluency of someone raised on
In the twelve months since he was elected for a second term, Donald Trump has driven an agenda more damaging to American democracy, rights, freedoms and international reputation than could have been predicted by even the most far-sighted political analyst. Where is the political opposition to citizens being snatched off
Since 2006, the Economist Intelligence Unit has measured the quality of democracy in 167 countries and territories across the world. Its last index, for 2024, was published in February. Over the past eighteen years, the average score has declined — both globally and for each of the world’s regions —
