Peter Hitchens

The new Oxford, with its fair share of Starbucks and burger joints, is far more convenient than the old—but it is not such a good place in which to think and imagine.  Continue Reading »

The architecture of the Palace of Westminster, which once seemed to dignify the business of the place, has been diminished by the Parliament inside it.  Continue Reading »

Borders are a substitute used by less fortunate lands for the sea and the mountains behind which happier countries shelter. No great civilization has grown and endured except behind the shield of ocean, mountain, or desert. How different Poland’s history would be if it had a few dozen miles of . . . . Continue Reading »

I never meant to start an argument about addiction. I had carried my private doubts on the subject around in my head for years, in the “heresy” section where I keep my really risky thoughts. And I don’t recommend disagreeing in public with Hollywood royalty, either, which is how it happened. . . . . Continue Reading »

George Bell, Bishop of Chichester: Church, State, and Resistance in the Age of Dictatorshipby andrew chandlereerdmans, 224 pages, $35The best way to get a belly laugh from a Roman Catholic is to mention the words “Anglican” and “principle” in the same breath. It is easy to see why. The . . . . Continue Reading »

The misreading of Russia’s geopolitical situation is especially sad because for the first time in many decades there is much to hope for in Moscow. Out of utopian misery has come the prospect of rebirth. It is as yet incipient. But I see great possibilities in it, in the many once-blighted . . . . Continue Reading »

A serious push for British independence is such a challenge to the new, supranational Europe that it throws the whole system out of gear.
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Yes, I remember the Church of England, much more than a name, a living thing. As it happens, my own religiously confused family was not churchgoing. By the early 1950s, most of the respectable English middle class had ceased to be especially religious, though they continued to respect faith. Church . . . . Continue Reading »