A Musical Mezze

Toby Ash serves up a mezze of Middle Eastern musical delights... There is only one starting point to any post on Arab music and that’s Egypt and the ‘Star of the East’ Umm Kulthum, who is widely lauded as the greatest Arab singer of the twentieth century. Born the daughter of an ... Read More...

The Life Of St Spivack

In response to Brit's musings on the saints in this week's Dabbler Diary, Frank tells the story of an overlooked martyr... When John Foxe published Actes And Monuments, popularly known as the Book of Martyrs, in 1563, he unaccountably neglected to mention St Spivack. This is a great pity, as St ... Read More...

Viva Italia!

Italy has given the world delicious food, beautiful people and boring football. But what has it gifted to slang? Jonathon Green investigates... I have been in Italy enjoying the kindness of friends. I, or such parts as were exposed, am now a pleasing light brown, patched pallid[1] only where shaded by ... Read More...

1p Book Review: Jane Gardam

Today we suggest you seek out the works of the representative of a long-lost tribe - many of them available for a mere penny on the web... Despite being prolific and successful, (twice winner of the Whitbread, winner of the Heywood Hill lifetime achievement prize et cetera), Jane Gardam is not ... Read More...

Suzanne Lenglen: Tennis As She Was Played

With Wimbledon getting underway once more, Nige takes a look back at one of tennis's greatest stars... The glamorous, exuberant French tennis player Suzanne Lenglen died in 1938, aged just 39. She died of pernicious anaemia, having been diagnosed with leukaemia, and lost her sight shortly before her death - the ... Read More...

Dabbler Diary – The Cruelty of Saints

At lunchtime on the day before the Sunday People published pictures of Charles Saatchi engaging in ‘a playful tiff’ with his wife, I was standing at a market stall outside his magnificent art gallery in Chelsea, slurping down oysters laced with Tabasco. They were horribly delicious. I ate half a ... Read More...

Hitler has only got one ball…

In this week's delve into the weirder recesses of Wikipedia, the Wikiworm brings you a reminder of a once popular school boy song. Personally I used the third variation involving the Albert Hall... "Hitler Has Only Got One Ball" is a British song that mocks Nazi leaders by referring to their ... Read More...

Muddy Mouth

When two of Frank's heroes collide, great art is made... I was a teenage Samuel Beckett fan. I owed my early enthusiasm to my English teacher, Richard Shone, who taught me between the ages of thirteen and eighteen, through my O and A Levels. He encouraged me to read widely outside ... Read More...