Modern Life

As the prison population ages, more and more elderly, often disabled inmates are left in their cells, unable to cope yet fearful of release

Whatever the economic inequalities between baby boomers and millennials, there has never been a better time to be young

Conceptualism was briefly a vital response to commercialism in modern art. Then it ran out of ideas

“The only thing worse than living in the mausoleum of a dead writer is living with a bunch of living ones”

“Social justice” and the New Left’s takeover of academic institutions

The dangerous new culture of brunch

From ‘flirt coaches’ and seminars on finding your soulmate to mail-order brides, falling in love has never been more commercialised   

Beethoven set the bar impossibly high but composers like myself still regard it as the ultimate challenge

On the set of the BBC’s recent adaptation of D.H. Lawrence’s novel, I realised that his most controversial book is as important as ever

How Britain discovered a lucrative new role as a global cultural powerhouse