Arts and Culture

A self-confident Britain holds sway, with the Spice Girls and Oasis to the fore. SOPHIA DEBOICK reports. Los del Río’s Macarena was an unlikely smash hit, but it became the biggest single of 1996. The middle-aged Latin pop duo from Seville had been knocking about since the early 1960s, but when this rumba from an […]

The singer re-emerged in one of his most ebullient incarnations, while another star unveiled his own signature move. SOPHIA DEBOICK reports That the international hit of 1983 was Culture Club’s Karma Chameleon proved that Britain still outstripped the rest of the world for boundary-pushing music. Pleasant pop it was, but its lyrical undercurrent of anguished […]

PETER TRUDGILL on some familiar celebratory Balkan phrases, and how they reflect the region’s complex linguistic history Macedonia is a geographical term which refers to an area of the southern Balkans. For some centuries, the region was part of the Ottoman Empire, ruled by the Turks from Constantinople. It contained a mixed and varied population […]

After Jonathan Franzen’s puffed-up advice for aspiring writers got a mauling online, CHARLIE CONNELLY offers his own, less pretentious tips. Midwinder – Credit: Archant Jonathan Franzen is a Serious Writer, the sort of Serious Writer who requires capital letters whenever you describe him as a Serious Writer. Most of us are serious writers inasmuch as […]

English music takes a radical turn which continues to resonate three centuries on – SOPHIA DEBOICK​ reports. After more than six years of civil war, the fabric of British society had been riven and the system of government dismembered by 1649. Religious certainties had crumbled as old power structures were torn down. In Scotland there […]

A new exhibition shows why the works of Anni Albers rank alongside the output of the greatest abstract expressionists. Claudia Pritchard reports Under ‘W’ in the Encyclopedia Britannica of 1963 the long entry on weaving was written by an expert in that craft who made a point of attributing the greatest skill to people who […]

JASON SOLOMONS on a tale of two films of the same story, and their very different fates. When we talk about entente cordiale, it very rarely refers to the French and British film industries. First of all, as Francois Truffaut infamously remarked to Alfred Hitchcock, the French think of ‘British’ and ‘cinema’ as two incompatible […]

Ahead of the centenary of the end of the First World War. CHARLIE CONNELLY reconstructs the moving and momentous events of the very first Armistice Day, assembling personal accounts from diaries, newspaper and museum archives. 05:00 Across Europe rain had fallen through the night. In Britain it fell on the towns and cities, villages and […]

A dominant, if unconventional, Irving Berlin was confounding the critics, as music took its first tentative steps towards ‘pop’. SOPHIA DEBOICK reports Sheet music cover image of ‘That International Rag’ by Irving Berlin. Picture: Sheridan Libraries/Levy/Gado/Getty Images – Credit: Getty Images Progress was the watchword of 1913. The US was at the vanguard, with the […]

PETER TRUDGILL on a grammar ‘rule’ ripe for debunking There seem to be quite lot of self-appointed experts on the English language around who like to invent grammatical rules. One of these ‘rules’, which Americans in particular seem to be very worried about, concerns among­ and between, and states that writers should only use between […]

SOPHIA DEBOICK on a forgotten TV classic from the 1970s, which treated its viewers like grown-ups. Talfryn Thomas in Survivors (1975) – Credit: Archant On the Wednesday night of April 16, 1975 at 8.10pm, immediately after the BBC 1 family film – a 1950s western starring Wildfire the Wonder Horse – Britain was hit with […]

Anthea Bell, who died last month, deserves to be remembered as one of the continent’s literary greats, says CHARLIE CONNELLY In Asterix the Legionary, where the eponymous hero and his sidekick Obelix travel to north Africa posing as Roman soldiers, there’s a scene in which the crew of a wrecked pirate ship find themselves stranded […]

After his death in the final week of the First World War Edward Connelly faded from family history, until a chance discovery by CHARLIE CONNELLY. He started to piece together the details of his relative’s short life and, in a powerful act of remembrance, undertook a personal pilgrimage, from the soldier’s place of birth to […]

Johann Sebastian Bach’s trek through Germany to Lubeck is a little known chapter in an extraordinary life. CHARLIE CONNELLY learns more. One evening in the late summer of 1705 Johann Sebastian Bach was walking across the main square in Arnstadt, Thuringia. He was 20 and two years into his job as organist at the Neue […]

A year on from rock and roll bursting on to the scene, 1956 was the moment youth culture truly took hold. SOPHIA DEBOICK on a pivotal moment. Hot on the heels of rock and roll’s breakthrough year, 1956 was an even more important 12 months in the history of music. While 1955 had seen Bill […]

JASON SOLOMONS reports from the London Film Festival on a British hat-trick and the return of Peter Jackson Josh O’Connor and Laia Costa in Only You. Photo: Getty – Credit: Archant As the last post on the annual festival circuit, the BFI London Film Festival has carved out a unique position in Europe as a […]

SOPHIA DEBOICK on a year when the pop charts were filled with vibrancy and variety.. characteristics that were about to become severely stifled There was never a dull moment to 1986. While the Sun gave us ‘Freddie Starr ate my hamster’, 30 million watched Dirty Den leave Angie on Christmas Day, and globally millions more […]

The very term used to describe the prejudice is itself born of prejudice. One of the most anti-Jewish words in the English language is anti-Semitic. In terms of the history of our language it’s a rather new word – no one used it until about 140 years ago. The term, as is well known, is […]

Before the Britpop steamroller removed it, the charts were filled with subtlety. SOPHIA DEBOICK looks back on a year of complexity Grunge seemed to be taking over the world as 1992 rolled into 1993. As Nirvana released In Utero in September and recorded their MTV Unplugged concert in November, their ascent continued unchecked, while Pearl […]

As recovery from the war continued, a new era of individualism and hedonism was already on the horizon. SOPHIA DEBOICK reports Al Jolson was the biggest star of 1920, a Broadway sensation who was fast emerging as a dominant recording artist. The hit song of the year, Gershwin’s Swanee, only became so after Jolson put […]

​Insecurity over the ‘correct’ use of pronouns has led language in an unusual direction, says PETER TRUDGILL In normal native English, the personal pronouns I, he, she, we, they are only used when they appear as the subject of a verb: I am leaving now; he likes coffee; she would like some; we are coming; […]

The life of ballet legend Rudolf Nureyev reads like a novel. As JASON SOLOMONS reports, every amazing chapter is captured in a new documentary film. Rudolf Nureyev unlikely partnership with Dame Margot Fonteyn is legend. Picture: Kalina Jones – Credit: Archant Rudolf Nureyev wasn’t just Lord of the Dance. He was an icon and a […]

It is home to the world’s tallest people and boasts 200 recorded spellings, but Leeuwarden’s real claim to fame is its artistic outlook. CLAUDIA PRITCHARD reports on a city which has taken the Capital of Culture title, and given it a twist There are only 79 known Ru ceramic objects in the world. One, a […]

PETER TRUDGILL on the unlikely origin of the name of a stretch of water off the Scottish coast The sea between the northern Outer Hebrides and the Scottish mainland is called the Minch, while the more southerly strait between the Outer Hebrides and the Isle of Skye is known as the Little Minch. The word […]

​He lived the archetypal life of a poet – intense, eventful and tragic. Yet Friedrich Hölderlin remains an obscure figure outside Germany. A newly-translated work, outlining a momentous existence, could change all that, says CHARLIE CONNELLY What are the key ingredients that make up the classic poet’s life? Is it the wilful excess and general […]

French pop provided the pioneers, as protest music also took voice. SOPHIA DEBOICK reports Before the Beatles invented the modern teenager in Britain, the Europeans were already ahead of the game. In 1962, France was churning out an iconoclastic, Americanised pop that threatened the grand tradition of chanson française at a time when the country […]

While the US produced a very raunchy scandal, British pop’s great controversy was a little more tame. Peter Andre and Katie Price coupled on I�m A Celebrity… (Photo by David Westing/Getty Images) – Credit: Getty Images Lewdness was in in 2004. As Justin Timberlake tore off part of Janet Jackson’s bustier at the Super Bowl […]

Peter Trudgill on a perfectly good word which may find its days numbered The Dutch word for ‘to buy’ is kopen. The corresponding word in German is kaufen; and the West Frisian equivalent is keapje. All the Scandinavian languages also have a related form: Norwegian kjøpe, Danish købe, Swedish köpa, Icelandic kaupa, and Faroese keypa. […]