May 2016

May 2016 issue

Past issues

Essays

©Urbancow/Getty Images

Gender—good for nothing

MYANMAR OUT Myanmar's newly-released opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi (L) waves to her supporters as she arrives at her National League for Democracy (NLD) headquarters in Yangon on November 14, 2010. Democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi reached out to My

Burma's uncrowned queen

Portrait of the artist as a young man: "works from 50 years ago will be re-imagined and reshaped to acquire new resonances" ©John Cohen/Getty Images

Bob Almighty

BRIDGWATER, ENGLAND - OCTOBER 03: Anti-nuclear protestors gather at the gates of Hinkley Point nuclear power station on October 3, 2011 in Bridgwater, England. Anti-nuclear protestors have blockaded the Somerset power station in reaction to EDF Energy's

The folly of Hinkley

Simon Taylor & Bronwen Maddox

©Iain Duncan Smith visits the East End of Glasgow in 2002, the scene of his "epiphany" ©Robert Perry/TSPL/Camera Press

Iain Duncan Smith: the quest of a quiet man

London: Time for Plan B

FPWJAX 7 signatories of the 1916 Easter Proclamation in Ireland.

The fading myths of Easter 1916

Ruth Dudley Edwards

A typical village in the Cevennes Mountains: "one of France's most remote and sparsely populated areas" ©Claudio Gioanni/Anni Colombo/Shutterstock

The French disconnection

Regulars

Stephen Collins's cartoon: Fantasy TV drama

Stephen Collins

The Generalist by Didymus: issue 242

In Fact issue 242

The way we were: Philanthropy

The Duel: Should all state schools become academies?

Lisa Freedman & Toby Young

©APA-PictureDesk/REX/Shutterstock

If I ruled the world: Karl Ove Knausgaard

Karl Ove Knausgaard

Opinions

Former President Bill Clinton, right, listens as his wife, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, speaks during a campaign stop at an Irish American pub in a midtown Manhattan hotel one day ahead of the New York primary, Monday, April 18, 2016

Hillary Clinton—one-term wonder?

FILE - In this Wednesday, March 30, 2016 photo, Pakistani Christians hold candles during a vigil for victims of a deadly suicide bombing last Sunday, in Lahore, Pakistan. The massive suicide bombing by a breakaway Taliban faction targeted Christians gathe

Will the Islamists spare Lahore?

Jeremy Corbyn, leader of the Labour Party, smiles after launching Labour's official local election campaign at Mark Hall & Netteswell Community Assoc, Moot House in, Harlow, Essex. ©Nick Ansell/PA Wire/Press Association Images

Labour's "real vote" test

Mandatory Credit: Photo by Alex MacNaughton Photography/REX/Shutterstock (5634286f) Protesters gathered outside Downing Street Panama Papers demonstration 'David Cameron: close tax loopholes or resign!', Whitehall, London, Britain - 09 Apr 2016

Don't call them tax havens

Nicholas Shaxson

British Prime Minister David Cameron arrives for an EU summit in Brussels on Friday, March 18, 2016. Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu on Friday said the refugee emergency is not something to be bargained over, as the European Union looks to send bac

Brexit would sink the pound

Anatole Kaletsky

An information screen displays information regarding the FTSE 100 at the London Stock Exchange. "" ©Yui Mok/PA Wire/Press Association Images

Are you successful—or just lucky?

A Chinese actor holds the horse prop from the Chinese theatre production of British play "War Horse" during a performance for the UK-China Year of Cultural Exchange at National Theatre of China, in Beijing Sunday, Sept. 20, 2015 ©Jason Lee/AP/Press Associ

China's cool, non-political youth

The Guardian Newspaper offices on York Way, north London ©John Stillwell/PA Archive/Press Association Images

Who guarded the Guardian? I did

Alan Rusbridger

Sir Nicholas Soames MP before the unveiling of a bust of Sir Winston Churchill in the grounds of Blenheim Palace, Oxfordshire. ©Andrew Matthews/PA Archive/Press Association Images

Interview: Nicholas Soames—There’s no such thing as “Project Fear”

Arts & Books

©Planet Flem/Getty Images

Timothy Garton Ash's free speech mission is idealistic—but we have to try

Khalid ibn al-Walid Mosque of Homs, Syria damaged heavily after rocket and howitzer shots. ©Robert Perry/TSPL/Camera Press

Can Syria rise from the ashes?

"Dining on the Edge of the Abyss": An American cartoon predicting the Wall Street Crash in 1929 © Peter Newark America Pictures/Bridgeman Images

The audacity of pessimism

Book review: Lab Girl by Hope Jahren

©Christies Images/Bridgeman Images

Graham Swift has boldly reworked the country house novel

Book review: Eligible by Curtis Sittenfeld

Book review: A Life Beyond Boundaries: A Memoir by Benedict Anderson

Book review: The Power Paradox by Dacher Keltner

Book review: Better Living Through Criticism by AO Scott

Book review: Global Inequality by Branko Milanovic

Book review: Britain and the Birth of the Modern World by Ben Wilson

Society and Culture

©10 Face/Shutterstock

Leith on life: Troll of trolls

©Kichgin/Shutterstock

Shrinking your friends

©Brian Jackson/Shutterstock

A small corner of safety

Easter in Seville

Lingering taste of Moorish past

Wendell Steavenson

Easter in Seville

Lingering taste of Moorish past

Wendell Steavenson

A Chinese actor holds the horse prop from the Chinese theatre production of British play "War Horse" during a performance for the UK-China Year of Cultural Exchange at National Theatre of China, in Beijing Sunday, Sept. 20, 2015 ©Jason Lee/AP/Press Associ

China's cool, non-political youth

©Shebeko/Shutterstock

The future of Champagne