From Our Archive
Articles in from our archive
Results 91 to 100 of 123
Holiday-making abroad
- 21 August 2006
Taken from the New Statesman archive, 13 February 1926.
Little doubt here that Clifford Sharp, the founding editor of the New Statesman, was a man to take his holidays abroad. This exchange, besides painting a picture of the English seaside hotel that anticipates Fawlty Towers by half a century and more, shows the great popularity of Switzerland as a holiday destination between the wars. In time prices there would outstrip even those of England's south coast.
Selected by Brian Cathcart
34 things every sociologist knows
- Alan Brien
- 14 August 2006
Taken from the New Statesman archive, 1 May 1970.
How many of these might you hear today? Number 2 and number 12, certainly, and perhaps number 34, which like a few others at least ought to be true. Whatever the reality was in 1970, I wonder how many modern Hull bridegrooms have met their wives at public dances. Alan Brien, critic, columnist and wit, was a regular contributor to the magazine in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
Selected by Brian Cathcart
Britain's tin red line
- Aylmer Vallance
- 07 August 2006
Taken from the New Statesman archive, 26 May 1951.
This visit to a factory floor in Walthamstow is also, I guess, a return to the nursery floor of the writer's childhood. Aylmer Vallance (1892-1955), a Scot, was a long-time deputy editor of the New Statesman. He had been a real soldier himself, serving in both world wars, though not in a bright uniform but in military intelligence. As for Britains, the brand survives in US ownership, selling soldiers made in China mainly to collectors.
Selected by Brian Cathcart
Arab land carved up
- Edward Mortimer
- 31 July 2006
Taken from the New Statesman archive, 11 June 1982.
Sometimes it seems that only the names change. For PLO read Hezbollah; for President Sarkis read the hapless Lebanese leadership of today. Edward Mortimer, too, has moved on: today he is director of communications for the UN secretary general, Kofi Annan.
Selected by Brian Cathcart
The Third Afghan War
- Herbert Sidebotham
- 17 July 2006
Taken from the New Statesman archive, 16 August 1919.
This conflict was over in just three months, concluding very much to Britain’s advantage. The Afghans, however, had issued a reminder that they were formidable adversaries. Sidebotham (1872-1940) was one of the leading military reporters of his day, much admired by Lloyd George, among others. This article, like many in the magazine’s early days, was unsigned, but the writer’s name appears in our contributors’ file. (It is worth remembering that the "Indian Government" he refers to was a distant limb of the imperial government in London.)
Selected by Brian Cathcart
A Rethinking Sermon
- Ralph Miliband
- 17 July 2006
Taken from the New Statesman archive, 7 November 1959.
Even today, when it seems depressingly prescient, this is a bracing read; in 1959 it must have been a shocker. Miliband (1924-94), a political theorist, was only an occasional contributor to the New Statesman. His two sons, David and Ed, are ministers in the present Labour government.
Selected by Brian Cathcart
The war in East London
- Ritchie Calder
- 10 July 2006
Taken from the New Statesman archive, 21 September 1940.
This article, so out of tune with the defiant, take-it-on-the-chin tone of much of the rest of the early coverage of the Blitz, caused a sensation when it appeared, and set in motion a campaign for better organisation of the official response to German bombing.
It was one of many articles contributed to the New Statesman over more than 20 years by the Scottish journalist and author Ritchie Calder (1906-82), who became Lord Ritchie-Calder.
This month is the centenary of his birth.
Selected by Brian Cathcart
Mr Wilson's Irish question
- Mary Holland
- 03 July 2006
Taken from the New Statesman archive, 6 December 1974.
Two weeks after the Birmingham pub bombings, Roy Jenkins's Prevention of Terrorism (Temporary Provisions) Bill was passing swiftly through a shocked parliament. Holland's qualms about the legislation have considerable resonance today, and many of the "draconian" measures involved, far from being temporary, remain in force.
Selected by Brian Cathcart
The hardness of water
- Jeremy Bugler
- 26 June 2006
Taken from the New Statesman archive, 23 July 1976.
The bound volumes of back numbers sometimes throw up an article from years ago that feels as though it could have been written yesterday. This is one of those. Besides the attitude of the Met Office not much seems to have changed, and Bugler's hope that we were being "parched for a purpose" in that famous year of drought seems to have been vain.
Selected by Brian Cathcart
Random reflections on sex
- J B Priestley
- 19 June 2006
Taken from the New Statesman archive, 23 August 1963.
Even in 1963, it seems, commercialisation and psychological overcomplication were putting young men and women under unwelcome pressure when it came to sex, and Americans apparently bore a good share of responsibility. The "recent events" which prompted these thoughts, however, were British: the Profumo affair. Priestley (1894-1984) was a New Statesman contributor over several decades.
Selected by Brian Cathcart
