Writing
Poet’s notebook
Living, as Clive James put it, under a life sentence, and having refused chemotherapy, I find I respond to the…
So long, P.J.
Fond memories of the great satirist
Playwright’s notebook
I’ve been keeping a journal for nearly 60 years. There are piles of the damn things in archives and covered…
Stones notebook
I’ve lived in Chelsea for the past 35 years. Since 2002, I’ve photographed everything I find interesting here — churches,…
The Spectator’s Notes
The interregnum between incumbents is a well-known and often elongated process in the Church of England. I have recently witnessed…
I adore haikus
They got me through the past year
Fight club
When book groups turn nasty
Writer’s notebook
Whenever I give talks to children about my books they always ask who inspired me to be a writer. I…
The wife’s story
‘One day,’ she writes, ‘we had the Minister for Northern Ireland for the night. He arrived wearing a kilt, which…
Writer’s notebook
When, three years ago, I announced my retirement from writing fiction, the only thing that surprised me was the surprise…
Diary
My diary has been filled with dental appointments, reflecting a truism that American dentists pray for British teeth. The tally…
Letters
The Union in peril Sir: Fraser Nelson (‘The great pretender’, 15 May) writes that it has never been easier to…
The writing’s on the wall
Towards the end of April, my mum sent me a letter. She doesn’t write as a rule — we speak…
Physicist’s notebook
Spring is coming. There was snow in the garden till last week, here in Canada, where I have been spending…
Diary
Safe spaces, diversity quotas, gender-neutral pronouns, culturally relative facts, heteronormative hegemony. Are my right-on credentials right on enough? Am I…
Stranger than fiction
How I’d write Covid: The Thriller
Author’s Notebook
In the middle of December, for reasons I’m coming to, I woke early in a posh hotel. I lay semi-dozing…
‘People confuse sadness with darkness’
An interview with the American novelist Mary Gaitskill
City of gold
Peter Ackroyd on the undimmed spirit of London
Diary
I’m often asked when I’ll write a pandemic novel. I’m not sure I’d ever be tempted, though the backdrop of…
Letter from Bangkok
Three years ago I sat down to write a novel set in my adopted home city. Placing its claustrophobic action…
Diary
The only female writers of importance I have personally met are Margaret Atwood and Joan Didion, both of whom are…
Comedian’s notebook
Empathy and kindness in these difficult times come more easily to some than others, but I’m trying. I had heart…
Stranger than fiction
Salman Rushdie on writing in the Age of Anything-Can-Happen
Diary
Writers like me are used to long hours alone. I’ve never enjoyed that side of it. I don’t like the…
