Pleasure and purpose
So here comes another book about how to be happy, written by Professor Dolan, an ‘internationally renowned expert’ at the…
Aesop on ageing gracefully
A drug has been invented to halt what is known as middle-aged spread. But it would be so much better…
Demosthenes on Johnson and Salmond
The ancient Greek word for ‘ambition’ was philotimia: ‘love of high esteem in others’ eyes’. Both Boris and Alex Salmond…
Bread, circuses and Hamas
There must be some reason why Hamas seems to remain quite unfazed by Israel’s merciless slaughter of its people. Perhaps…
Hadrian on the limits of power
Michael Fallon, the new Defence Secretary, is a classicist by training. What lessons, if any, might he take from his…
Plutarch on the iPhone
Adults, we are told, as much as children, become gibbering wrecks if deprived of their mobiles or iPhones for more…
The rumour mill
Geoffrey Dickens’s ancient dossier of (alleged) paedophiles in high places cannot be found among the 138 miles of government files,…
The Ancient way of death
There is something mildly unexpected about religious groups’ hostility to euthanasia. After all, in the ancient world one of the…
Brussels vs Sparta
The EU is a federation of states (Latin foedus, ‘treaty’, from the same root as fides, ‘trust, good faith’). But…
Fishing with Plutarch
Dr Culum Brown of Macquarie University, Australia, has been doing some research on fish, and concludes that they are intelligent,…
Apollodorus on tax avoidance
The taxman will soon be ordering those planning dodgy tax avoidance schemes to declare them beforehand and pay the full…
The true gods of football
The World Cup has started, and the gods of football will be in their heaven for a whole month. Not…
Caesar and Farage
Our politicians are desperately keen to turn the toast of the people, Nigel Farage, into toast himself. But is that…
Ancient Greek wealth taxes
After 685 tightly argued pages, the ‘superstar’ economist Thomas Piketty unfolds his master-plan for closing the gap between the rich…
Plato at the Jobcentre
Labour is up in arms because many of the new jobs currently being created are among the self-employed. This seems…
Xenophon on immigration
Nearly half of Britain’s billionaires are foreigners, and government hopes many more will now come in on the government ‘start…
Ukraine vs Sparta
As rebels, terrorists, fascists, foreign forces, activists, separatists, militants, militias, nationalist groups, Neo-Nazis, Right Sector forces — take your pick — spread…
Boris’s Periclean optimism
What is Boris’s great secret? Does it lie in the bust of the Athenian statesman Pericles (c. 495–429 bc) that…
A war for ‘human rights’
What a splendidly liberal leader Mr Putin has turned out to be, desiring nothing other for his fellow Russians than…
How we could hound officials
If the continuing rows over the expenses and lifestyles of certain MPs cast all of them in a bad light,…
Socrates on Maria Miller
Our former culture secretary, Maria Miller, is still apparently baffled at the fuss created by her fighting to the last…
David Cameron, oracle
Nigel Farage rather missed a trick in his debate over the EU with Nick Clegg. The Prime Minister has promised…
Epicurus on particle physics
According to a top TV scientist, in the beginning there was ‘empty space’ and ‘energy’. After a big bang, the…
Good teachers
Last week in The Spectator, Daisy Christodoulou argued that, contrary to current educational theory, children learned best via direct instruction…
Cicero on Putin
Last September Russian President Vladimir Putin warned against a ‘unipolar’ world, saying that the national revival of Russia was in…
