Cover

The dog’s last walk

So long as there are women laughing, civilisation’s safe

Experience is lovelier than innocence

How to live forever

Sweet boy, that Jihadi John

All sportsmen die in hotels

Did you see what my arm just did?

Darts: the last refuge of the serious

The erotic gravitas of George Galloway

In God’s name, why?

Fisherman’s friend

Ignorance is Bravo Lima India Sierra Sierra

In the country of the deaf the man with subtitles is king

‘Get out of my face!’

Raising the age of consent

Arrivederci Raffaele

Fanatics only ever read one book

Boris and the bikes

Strictly turn-off

Who dunnit? The one who dunnit last time

There was a rabbi of Kiev

A pocket manual of blame

Death is Venice

How not to be a knob

The glorious madness of Wisden

You’re going the wrong way, mate

Let’s introduce ourselves: what’s your username?

How very dare you

You can’t enjoy Proust or aloo gobi standing up

The shame that outlives us

Calm down, dear

The New Barbarism

Shoot the highwayman

But what if I don’t want to connect to you?

Nostril hair and the university

The sweet seductiveness of loss

Nellie, I am Catherine Earnshaw

The phoenix and the turtle

The wages of indulgence is darts

What’s Hecuba to you?

In Leonard Cohen’s fedora you too can look like L. S. Lowry

The unhappy wanderer

At least the old aren’t young

There’s always another Dark Lady

Is that all there is?

Flyting, sledging, and where to stick your asterisks

Steady on, Lawrence

Conformity kills

A self-effacing man

When enough’s enough

The world turned upside down

Down and out in Covent Garden

The star is fallen

Advice to a young artist: Don’t be yourself

Tenho saudades tuas

American buffalo

The Queen versus Edward Snowden

Into the digital darkness

Nights in white satin; nuns in red nighties

Killing is a serious business

In praise of insincerity

The ghost speech

And no I said no I won’t No: Molly Bloom decides against casting a vote in the 2015 elections

Culpability Brown

Dumb also degrades

Weeping in the new year

Is that a bomb you’re carrying or are you just pleased to see me?

Damnation for dummies

Remembering Odin Testostenhammur

It isn’t a day of rest we need, it’s a day unlike the day before

These things of darkness

Offence is sacred

And it’s goodnight from him

A Note on the Author