Milan Kundera and Victoria Amelina, both distinguished East European writers with first-hand experience of Russian authoritarianism, have died within days of each other. Milan Kundera, 1 April 1929 Brno, Czechoslovakia, started out as an enthusiastic Communist party member in his youth but was latterly expelled as he spoke up in 1970 during the clampdown that … Read more
Hollywood has ground to a halt with actors and writers on strike over earnings for the lower paid with streaming and AI technology shifting the goalposts in favour of the studios’ coffers. What broke the camel’s back and brought matters to a head was the suggestion that extras “should be able to be scanned and … Read more
The UK is facing a “nightmare scenario” of China controlling sensitive national infrastructure, including nuclear power stations, universities and the technology sector. The regime is using money and spies to penetrate every sector of economy, according to an MPs report. Lurching from the Russia threat and before that Middle Eastern autocrats buying up the … Read more
Sex and the BBC has a decidedly sleazy feel with yet another alleged entanglement between a presenter and a teen over torrid online encounters and shedloads of money for porno pics which supposedly fuelled the boy’s cocaine addiction. Nothing is established in hard fact as yet and the BBC’s excuse for leaving it to stew … Read more
Cillian Murphy of Peaky Blinders renown is portraying another morally ambiguous character in Oppenheimer, Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster out this month about the ‘father of the atomic bomb.’ The real question for Murphy plumbing the soul of theoretical physicist Robert Oppenheimer was what combination – ambition, madness, delusion and/or deep hatred of the Nazis allowed … Read more
Women’s rights are a relatively recent phenomenon in historical terms even in the west. Full voting rights were established in many countries only in the early 20th Century. The UK took several steps towards equality in voting starting in 1918 with a final completion in 1928. The USA adopted full suffrage for women in 1920, … Read more
Cary Grant, one of Hollywood’s golden agers, is about to be introduced to a new generation 37 years after his death, with an ITVX series ‘Archie’ about his life. A handsome, suave, debonair, light-hearted actor with a sense of comic timing, he was everyone’s idea of a polished gentleman. But his beginnings in extreme poverty … Read more
Into Elon Musk’s twitter chaos steps his arch-rival Mark Zuckerburg intent on launching a tweeting challenger in the form of ‘Threads’ this Thursday. Described as a ‘text-based conversation app… where communities come together’, it is linked to Instagram, which has 500 million daily users worldwide. Experts say it could be the biggest threat that Musk … Read more
Cricket – a bat-and-ball game played between two teams – is to the uninitiated a leisurely amble across well-cut grass where gentlemen play for the enjoyment of playing and the win is of secondary importance. Except when it turns into a culture clash between nations. There has been outrage over some obscure misdemeanour by the … Read more
The gathering storm that will blight Israel’s path over the coming years broke on cue as Uranus moves to explode the destructive Israel Saturn/Mars midpoint, heading to conjunct the deeply buried Israel Sun in Taurus from mid August onwards. A major aerial and ground offensive into the West Bank city of Jenin was launched early … Read more