Why not euros?, p56
Spencer traces, p102
A web developer writes, p40
5 Leading article 8 Portrait of the Year 11 Diary Sebastian Faulks 15 The Spectator’s Notes 19 Artist’s notebook
Andrew Marr 20 Letter from London
Melvyn Bragg 22 Politics James Forsyth 33 Rod Liddle 38 Barometer 40 Digital notebook
Lily Cole 42 Mind your language 52 Writer’s notebook
Anthony Horowitz 56 Matthew Parris 59 Ancient and modern 61 James Delingpole 62 Hugo Rifkind 64 Letters from the archive 65 Letters 70 Any other business Martin Vander Weyer
The next issue of The Spectator will be dated 4 January 2014. Deborah Ross is away.
12 The new Great Game
How Putin bluffs the West Garry Kasparov 16 Cameron’s gifts
An interview with the PM Fraser Nelson 17 Alan Brownjohn
‘Bar Mirror’: a poem 24 Spectator Christmas survey
What would you tell your 14-year-old self? 26 A nice gentle murder On detective fiction’s golden age
P.D. James 28 P.D. James
‘Bleeding-under-Wychwood’: a poem 30 Double vision
On Lucian Freud and Francis Bacon Martin Gayford 34 Christmas pheasant
How to cook for the big day Norman Tebbit 37 Protect the Christians The Middle East’s persecuted people
Michael Nazir-Ali 38 On the contrary
Peregrine Worsthorne at 90 Harry Mount
43 Voices of England
In praise of hymn singing Quentin Letts 44 Afghanistan year zero
Facing up to the US withdrawal Ahmed Rashid 47 The Boy on the Hillside
A Christmas short story by Susan Hill 51 My life after death I ‘died’ — but then I got better
Emma Cowing 54 Never again?
The long legacy of 1914 Norman Stone 66 The Road Not Travelled
A short story by William Boyd Boks 74 Sam Leith Bernard Berenson,
by Rachel Cohen 76 Anne Applebaum Red Fortress,
by Catherine Merridale 78 Justin Marozzi
The Histories, by Herodotus 79 Simon Drew ‘Spot the Play Title’
Cover by Peter Brookes. Drawings by Michael Heath, Castro, Stephen Collins, Phil Disley, Kate Baylay, Holland, Polk, Grizelda, Nick Newman, RGJ, Adam Singleton, Len, Mazurke, Steve Way, Geoff Thompson, Bernie, NAF, Rodgie, Robert Thompson, Warner, K.J. Lamb, Cookson, Dish, Royston Robertson, Kipper Williams and Nick Baker. www.spectator.co.uk To subscribe to The Spectator for £104 a year, turn to page 118 Editorial and advertising The Spectator, 22 Old Queen Street, London SW1H 9HP, Tel: 020 7961 0200, Fax: 020 7681 3773, Email: editor@spectator.co.uk (editorial); letters@spectator.co.uk (for publication); advertising@spectator.co.uk (advertising); Advertising enquiries: 020 7961 0222 Subscription and delivery queries Spectator Subscriptions Dept., 800 Guillat Avenue, Kent Science Park, Sittingbourne ME9 8GU; Tel: 01795 592886 Fax: 0870 220 0290; Email: spectator@servicehelpline.co.uk Newsagent queries Spectator Circulation Dept, 22 Old Queen Street, London SW1H 9HP, Tel: 020 7961 0200, Fax: 020 7681 3773, Email: dstam@spectator.co.uk Distributor COMAG Specialist, Tavistock Works, Tavistock Road, West Drayton, Middlesex UB7 7QX Vol 323; nos 9668–9670 © The Spectator (1828) Ltd. ISSN 0038-6952 The Spectator is published weekly by The Spectator (1828) Ltd at 22 Old Queen Street, London SW1H 9HP Editor: Fraser Nelson
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the spectator | 14–28 december 2013 | www.spectator.co.uk
