As Frank reveals, stand-up comedians have always played a vital role in British political decision-making... In his Dabbler Diary on Monday, Brit noted the delusion of contemporary “panel show comedians that they are public intellectuals, superior in their integrity and insight to the corrupt political class”. This widespread phenomenon leads the ... Read More...

Jassy's bibliophilic lusts lead her to go Dutch... Of all the vices that spatter my soul, like toothpaste across a mirror, buying secondhand cookbooks is the one I find the hardest to give up. It might not seem that terrible a habit to you. Noble even – the pursuit of knowledge ... Read More...

Professor Nick Groom's book The Seasons: An Elegy for the Passing of the Year is a celebration of the English seasons and the trove of strange folklore and often stranger fact they have accumulated over the centuries. Following his Christmas post for The Dabbler, Nick turns his attention to February... All the ... Read More...

Nige reflects on the power and meaning of still life painting, in the light of a book by American poet Mark Doty... Still Life with Oysters and Lemon is the title of a painting by Jan Davidsz de Heem (above)  that hangs in the Metropolitan Museum in New  York - or ... Read More...

Waking before dawn I first reached for my phone to check on England’s latest reassuringly routine cricket thrashing by Australia, then groaned out of bed to descend and in the kitchen force tea and toast into unwelcoming guts. Twice since the last diary I have had long work days in ... Read More...

The poet Walt Whitman inspired not only writers but composers too. Here, Mahlerman introduces four exceptional pieces... The great American humanist poet and essayist Walter 'Walt'  Whitman believed that music had mystical, supernatural powers - in fact it was the only art-form he acknowledged to be greater than poetry, the 'music' ... Read More...

There's something very 'Tarantino-esque' about today's unusual Wikipedia article, which sounds like the script to a film that hasn't been made yet... The Battle for Castle Itter took place in the final days of World War II, five days after the death of Adolf Hitler. Popular accounts of the battle have ... Read More...