Totalitarian Speech Regimes

by John William O’Sullivan

A totalitarian speech regime must impose its rules through institutions that the majority of people see as alien; an organic speech regime relies on implicit consensus. Continue Reading »

27 Jul 2020

Why I Love Trains

by Peter Hitchens

The feeling of peace and irresponsibility that spreads through me as the train heaves itself out of the station is a special joy. Continue Reading »

16 Jul 2020

Iconoclasm Returns to Oxford

by Peter Hitchens

All over Britain, statues of forgotten politicians, merchants, generals, and admirals are being investigated. Continue Reading »

18 Jun 2020

We Love Big Brother

by Peter Hitchens

My beloved city, Oxford, is closed and silent, like a large, well-ordered cemetery. Continue Reading »

1 Apr 2020

The Strain on the British Monarchy

by Peter Hitchens

The monarch, stripped of all ancient direct power, is now remarkably like the king on a chessboard—almost incapable of offensive action, but preventing others from occupying a crucial square.  Continue Reading »

14 Jan 2020

The Unreasonable Man

by Augustus Howard

Speaking to his friend Frederick Lindemann in the 1920s, Winston Churchill remarked, “Far too much has been and is being written about me.” Among Churchill’s many chroniclers, even at that early date, was Churchill himself: a true history-writing history-maker, who wrote not only to make money . . . . Continue Reading »

1 Jan 2020

The Individualist

by Dan Hitchens

On February 2, 2018, seven members of a group called Bristol Antifascists assembled outside a lecture hall at the University of the West of England in Bristol. They donned balaclavas or dark glasses, according to taste, and entered through the double doors at the back of the hall. “No platform for . . . . Continue Reading »

1 Jan 2020

The Test for the Tories

by Dan Hitchens

All political movements have internal tensions, but the new Tory coalition seems unusually incoherent. Continue Reading »

19 Dec 2019

Boris and a New Tory Democracy

by Augustus Howard

With a full, eighty-seat majority in the House of Commons, Johnson’s Conservatives now have the opportunity to change British politics for a generation or more.  Continue Reading »

16 Dec 2019

Boris: The New Blair

by Peter Hitchens

Mr. Johnson has portrayed himself as the new Blair, a friendly figurehead who appears unthreatening while concealing a vast agenda of change. Continue Reading »

14 Dec 2019