Holland
The ruff stuff
Why is Frans Hals still not considered the equal of Rembrandt, asks Craig Raine
Dutch courage
The Forgotten Battle is a Dutch feature film commemorating the desperate and relatively little-known Allied assault on the Scheldt estuary…
A short history of ice skating
In landscape terms, the Fens don’t have much going for them. What you can say for them, though, is that…
Wings of desire
Maria Sibylla Merian was a game old bird of entrepreneurial bent, with an overwhelming obsession with insects. Born in Frankfurt…
Whoever invented referendums needs a kicking
My favourite quote of the year so far comes from the author Fay Weldon. ‘If this were an all-woman society,’…
Hellzapoppin’
The 20th-century painter who called himself Balthus once proposed that a monograph about him should begin with the words ‘Balthus…
The bicycle may have triumphed but it’s far from perfect
The bicycle may have triumphed over the car but it’s far from perfect, argues Stephen Bayley
Look beyond ‘Girl with a Pearl Earring’ in The Hague
What a fate it is to be hung next to the most famous painting in a gallery. To be overlooked,…
Europe’s ever-looser union
Europhiles have warned us for years of the dangers of Britain leaving the EU. But all the while a different…
Death watch
If you don’t think legalising ‘assisted dying’ is a slippery slope, you haven’t been paying attention
Mistress of modernism
What classical music really needs is more performers like Barbara Hannigan. Philip Clark meets theself-conducting soprano
