Roy Jenkins
Delightful nostalgia for political wonks: The Gang of Three, at the King’s Head Theatre, reviewed
The Gang of Three gets into the nitty-gritty of Labour politics in the 1970s. It opens with the resignation of…
Six politicians who shaped modern Britain
The members of Vernon Bogdanor’s select gathering may not always have succeeded in their aims, but by sticking their heads above the parapet they made the political weather
There’s space for a new party in Britain, but not for another SDP
I was 17 when the Labour party last split, in January 1981, and for a variety of reasons got quite…
Rab Butler was too indecisive (and badly dressed) to be Prime Minister
‘The best prime minister we never had’ is not an epithet exclusive to Rab Butler. Widely applied to the late…
Diary
Until recently I used to claim that I had been literary editor of The Spectator for over 25 years; now…
A toast to Le Roi Jean Quinze
There ought to be a new literary award: the antisocial book of the year. A dozen years ago, Claire Tomalin’s…
The Spectator’s notes
Everyone can see that the West has no idea what to do about Russian power in the Ukraine. Britain, in…
