10 December 2001
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From the Editor…
Welcome to the New Statesman website. Whether you are a new reader or an existing one - online or via the magazine - I hope you'll enjoy the great writing, fresh ideas and provocative debate that make the New Statesman Britain's award-winning current affairs weekly
Cover story
The New Statesman Special Report - The great Koran con trick
Scholars claim that Islam's holy book is not quite what it seems
Features
The scene is set for another Lebanon
Arafat's real crisis is among his own people. They see him as just an Israeli sheriff who happens to speak their language. By Charles Glass in Jerusalem
The new face of America
Andrew Stephen unravels the great anthrax mystery and concludes that, even if Iraq is responsible, the US military provided the original raw materials
One more, one less, who cares?
Even an imperial birth has failed to excite Japan or its depressed economy. Victoria James reports
The divided left
Socialists oppose capitalist globalisation; reformists want to make it work for the global poor. Which side are you on?
Hold on, where did that £21bn go?
Before the Chancellor raises taxes to pay for the NHS, he should ask what happened to the last injection of cash. Jo Revill reports
Yes, you can be serious, just a tiny bit
Divorce down, boozing and DIY up, but did 11 September truly change us?
The voice that can only croak
He ought to be full of energy and brimming with ideas. But Iain Duncan Smith is neither, and Tories are already talking about the next leader
Il Duce's heirs
The Tory leader makes centrist noises, but he and his supporters betray some frightening right-wing tendencies
Be thankful for comprehensives
The latest school survey is a blow to advocates of selection: mixing up social classes reduces inequality without harming overall results
Interview
The New Statesman Interview - Peter Morris
The top surgeon in the land says the state of the NHS is "desperate" and the government is unfit to run it. Peter Morris interviewed
Culture
The new rock'n'roll
Consuming the past has become big business. But are we in danger of turning history into a heritage cult, asks Matthew Dodd
Stoned
Art - Ned Denny on how the shamans of the Amazon got their highs
Law of the jungle
Hollywood - Johann Hari on how American films are satisfying the taste for revenge
Theatre
Coming up roses
Theatre - Katherine Duncan-Jones on an enigmatic mumming show by the author of Peter Pan
Television
The tracks of their tears
Television - Andrew Billenapplauds Ken Loach's elegy to our crumbling railways
Books
Seize the day. Has Saul Bellow written his last book? Stephen Amidon on the work of a modern master and the search for a place in the American century
Collected Stories Saul Bellow Viking, 442pp, £20 ISBN 067089172X
Mother love
Mary: the unauthorised biography Michael Jordan Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 338pp, £14.99 ISBN 0297842528
Dishonourable member
No, Prime Minister Teresa Gorman Blake Publishing, 368pp, £16.99 ISBN 1904034004
High art lite. Nicholas Blincoe deconstructs the most hyped novel of the year
The Corrections Jonathan Franzen Fourth Estate, 566pp, £17.99 ISBN 1841156728
Novel of the week
The Stone Council Jean-Christophe Grange, translated by Ian Monk Harvill Press, 373pp, £10 ISBN 1860468640
Trucking hell
The Eddie Stobart Story Hunter Davies HarperCollins, 282pp, £14.99 ISBN 0007115970
Passing the baton
Simon Rattle: from Birmingham to Berlin Nicholas Kenyon Faber and Faber, 358pp, £20 ISBN 0571205488
After the gold rush
A Very Public Offering: a rebel's story of business excess, success and reckoning Stephan Paternot with Andrew Essex John Wiley, 256pp, £20.95 ISBN 0471007862 Boo hoo: a dot.com story from concept to catastrophe Ernst Malmsten, Erik Portanger, Charles Drazin Random House, 386pp, £17.99 Dot.bomb: Inside an Internet goliath - from lunatic optimism to Panic and Crash J David Kuo Little, Brown, 313pp, £14.99 Dot.bomb: the rise and fall of dot.com Britain Rory Cellan-Jones Aurum Press, 250pp, £10.99
Paperback reader
War, Baby Kevin Mitchell Yellow Jersey Press, 184pp, £10 ISBN 0224060724
Think again
Three Journeys in the Levant Shusha Guppy Starhaven, 146pp, £10 ISBN 0936315172
