How Iraq was lost
Steve Coll’s account of America’s relationship with Saddam Hussein reveals a series of devastating blunders.
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Keir Starmer’s thirst for power
A landmark new biography portrays the Labour leader as a man with an entirely abnormal drive and a narrow-eyed focus…
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The women that books built
How the bluestockings used wit and learning to subvert a deeply misogynist culture.
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How Breathtaking brought tears to the Baftas
Also this week: In awe of maverick nurses, and why swearing should be prescribed on the NHS.
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In The Iron Claw, Zac Efron stands out
Efron is an underrated actor, and this is a star-making performance.
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Laufey at EartH: woozy and nostalgic love songs
The Chinese-Icelandic singer mixes classical and jazz influences in her old-fashioned take on pop.
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Jacob Collier’s internal weather
The 29-year-old made a career taking theory to the masses, but believes his real “superpower” is his instinct for his…
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Leslie Jamison’s Splinters captures the paradoxes of motherhood
This intimate memoir explores the contradictions of being a parent, a partner and an artist – singly, and all at…
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Sarah Snook’s one-woman The Picture of Dorian Gray is gimmicky and shallow
Technical bravura, camera trickery and a high-wire, high-energy performance are not enough to make this show enjoyable or meaningful.
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Subscriber of the week: Bill Gilby
Please email zuzanna.lachendro@newstatesman.co.uk if you would like to be featured.
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Evgeny Lebedev’s vanity podcast
The media mogul and lord of the realm dabbles with psychoactive substances in the latest episode of Brave New World.
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Jen Gunter Q&A: “I wanted to be a detective and drive around in a convertible”
The gynaecologist and author on Nancy Drew, abortion rights, and what would be a truly unforgettable episode of Mastermind.
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Antarctica’s penguins may yet be safe from bird flu, but other threats remain
If the birds are lost, it will be due to commercial over-fishing and our failure to take simple steps to…
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I was excited about The New Look – but the series is cringe inducing
This Apple TV+ drama following Christian Dior during the rise of the Nazis is full of poor dialogue and every…
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Frank Auerbach’s unsettling charcoal heads
These portraits have a haunted quality, the spectres of all the deleted images that went before.
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Why The Taste of Things is more than just “food porn”
The movie was derided by French critics as indulgent, with undertones of rancid conservatism. Actually, it’s a love story.
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John Tavener’s sacred music for a secular world
The English composer’s accidental masterpiece The Protecting Veil communicates a deep human longing for the eternal.
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Layla Moran: “I’m searching for kernels of hope in the rubble”
The Liberal Democrat MP on polarisation and her relatives trapped in Gaza.
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This England: Send in the artillery
This column – which, though named after a line in Shakespeare’s “Richard II”, refers to the whole of Britain –…
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Water bills rise because we have sold off the very rain that falls on our soil
Private water companies have gorged on debt and neglected infrastructure, leaving Britain unable to deal with either drought or deluge.
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