Welcome to the AI doom wars
On Monday, Jacob Coxon briefly became the most talked-about man in Silicon Valley. Resigning from his job as a researcher at Anthropic, he assailed his ex-employer in the bluntest of…
Are you diverse enough to foster?
Fiona*, our new social worker, had checked the padlocked bolt on our garden-shed door; she had run her hand over our mattresses to make sure they were soft. Now she…
How Goalhanger seduced the bourgeoisie
The Southbank Center has hosted many great cultural events over the years. In 1951, the Festival of Britain almost single-handedly dragged British art out of its postwar slump. In 1958,…
Barbara Cartland: masked masochist
Romance fiction is the genre of masochism: it’s less about love than control, less about pleasure than pain. This is why Matthew Sweet calls his superb new life of Cartland…
MAGA’s Latin-American crime thriller
It was an episode straight out of a hit narconovela (the subgenre of Latin-American telenovelas that feature gangland violence in addition to the usual raunchy romance). Nadia, an expectant mother,…
Putin: the blind autocrat
In The Wizard of the Kremlin, a movie whose most impressive achievement is making Russian history boring, Paul Dano plays a Kremlin PR hack tasked with building what Putin, played…
How Wendell Berry saved my life
I owe Wendell Berry my life. Not literally, of course, but maybe in a deeper and more important sense, the life that I now lead. Considering myself truly blessed with…
Could the Middlesbrough crime spree spread?
The first people I spoke to in Middlesbrough told me to fuck off. He was drinking lager and kicking a tennis ball for a cocker spaniel; she was sitting outside…
Could the Middlesbrough crime spree spread?
The first people I spoke to in Middlesbrough told me to fuck off. He was drinking lager and kicking a tennis ball for a cocker spaniel; she was sitting outside…
Britain has a leadership fetish
What is it with Britain and the word “leadership” these days? We have had seven prime ministers in 10 years — four of whom were unelected, one of whom won…