The internet has taken away the joy of boredom
July 2, 2020
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Bored, bored, bored … That’s been my coronavirus experience. Luckily, I’ve avoided the plague. But I’ve been thrown on my
Diary: The reactionary hacks who turn to the Church
March 12, 2020
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Before the journalist and former Private Eye editor Christopher Booker died last year, aged 81, he’d just finished a book, Groupthink: A
London’s nearly perfect pub
January 16, 2020
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Last Wednesday, at 9pm, I had a splendid choice of murder programmes to watch. There was White House Farm, about
The long twilight of the Roman gods
January 2, 2020
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How to Think about God By Marcus Tullius Cicero, translated by Philip Freeman Princeton, 151pp, £13.99/$16.95 This handy little book
The morality of dressing well
December 19, 2019
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What should you wear at Christmas parties? And how should you look presentable without looking vain? I stumbled upon the
The sweet, neglected pastures of Latin
November 21, 2019
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Long Live Latin by Nicola Gardini, Profile, 256pp, £14.99/$26 Is Latin still alive? Yes, there are some intellectuals like Benedict
The best drink I’ve had all year is a Stella
November 14, 2019
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A new all-women’s club, AllBright, is doing fantastically well in its branches in Mayfair and Fitzrovia. So well, in fact,
Habemus App-am! Duolingo has finally launched a Latin course
September 5, 2019
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“Of course, no one ever actually spoke Latin,” a particularly stupid – and incompetent – Latin teacher once told a
Diary: The weekend I nearly died of embarrassment
August 1, 2019
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This weekend, I nearly died of embarrassment – literally. I was making my way down to Bullslaughter Bay, a remote
Diary: I hope Boris proves his old tutor wrong
June 20, 2019
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What a pleasure it is to listen to the Vatican news in Latin – or Hebdomada Papae, notitiae vaticanae latine
Diary: Don’t dismiss punctuality as a minor virtue
May 16, 2019
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In Budapest last weekend, I loved the collision of architectural styles: onion-domed churches from the east; classical palaces from Italy;
When it’s forgivable to make a phone call in church
April 4, 2019
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In the Yorkshire seaside town of Whitby last week, I looked round St Mary’s Church – a spectacular number in