10 May 2004
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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
Features
Torture: Simply the spoils of victory?
The French in Algeria, the British in Northern Ireland: soldiers have long resorted to abusing and humiliating their captive enemy. So why are we so shocked by the photos from Iraq?
Who should we believe?
The more people are victimised, the less account we take of their witness to torture and abuse
Facts that should change the world
Landmines kill or maim at least one person every hour and, of the population of Cambodia, one in every 236 is an amputee
To know the countryside, you must live in the city
Country folk, tradition has it, are in tune with nature. Wrong. They have long shown woeful ignorance of everything from worms to badgers and foxes
How to bring politicians to heel
Mathew Little on a voters' group that plans to turn elections upside down by issuing its own manifesto
The end of the probation service
It sounds like a good idea - putting people who deal with offenders, both in prison and out of it, under the same management. But expect a bureaucratic shambles
America's barbecue vote
They work longer hours than Dad did, regret not having wives who stay at home, and hate seeing those minorities getting uppity. Meet the angry white men Bush can rely on
Essay
NS Essay - We should have made it clear that we too were modernisers
Roy Hattersley admits that Blair's critics failed to argue their own case for "modern social democracy" with enough vigour. If they press their programme now, it is not too late to rescue the government
Interview
NS Interview - Charlie Falconer
''Tony Blair will lead the party into the next election on the basis that he will run the full term,'' says the PM's confidant-in-chief. Charlie Falconer interviewed
Regulars
Mark Thomas blames Labour for the BNP
Blair and co helped to create the hysteria over asylum-seekers. Now they insist the only way to beat the BNP is to vote Labour. What a cheek!
Darcus Howe explains why St George fails to stir him
This country's alliance of tribes has always relied on amiable English compromise
Competition
Win vouchers to spend at any Tesco store
Culture
In Vincent's footsteps
Van Gogh slept with countless prostitutes and even gave his ear to one. But the importance of sex in his life and work has been ignored in the sweetly mythologised image of him as a sunflower-painting saint. Waldemar Januszczak reveals the artist's true colours
Baloneyland
Opera - Peter Conrad enjoys a stingingly up-to-date satire marking Poland's admission to the EU
Noble rot
Art - Richard Cork revels in the riotous abundance of Cy Twombly
Theatre
Michael Portillo - The cap of youth
Theatre - Trevor Nunn's wonderfully fresh production presents the prince as a morose teenager. By Michael Portillo Hamlet Old Vic, London SE1
Film
Mark Kermode - Sympathy for the devil
Film - Of two tales of sex, drugs and rock'n'roll, it is the film made 30 years ago that thrills. By Mark Kermode Wonderland (18) Performance (18)
Television
Andrew Billen - English delight
Television - Sad life and sparky fiction from the man who made the Mail. By Andrew Billen The Two Loves of Anthony Trollope (BBC1)
The Fan
The fan - Hunter Davies welcomes Delia to the Premiership
A big welcome to Delia. At last, a woman of substance in the Premiership
Books
Anthropologist, study thyself. So the English are eccentric, self-deprecating and good at queueing - what's new? Forget such observations. That an Oxford social scientist can get away with producing witless, patronising pap tells us much more about contemporary England
Watching the English: the hidden rules of English behaviour Kate Fox Hodder & Stoughton, 424pp, £20 ISBN 0340818859
A paean to peace
The Unconquerable World: power, non-violence, and the will of the people Jonathan Schell Allen Lane, the Penguin Press, 435pp, £20 ISBN 0713997664
Out of the groove
Where Have All the Good Times Gone?: the rise and fall of the record industry Louis Barfe Atlantic, 395pp, £17.99 ISBN 1843540657
Mad world
Alexander the Corrector: the tormented genius who unwrote the Bible Julia Keay HarperCollins, 269pp, £16.99 ISBN 000713195X
A biographer's tale
Mosaic Michael Holroyd Little, Brown, 283pp, £17.99 ISBN 0316725056
Fiction - Veiled hatred
Snow Orhan Pamuk Faber & Faber, 436pp, £12.99 ISBN 0571220657
Fiction - Where to wax
Bergdorf Blondes Plum Sykes Viking, 320pp, £10 ISBN 0670914339
Commentary
Rosie Millard may run a posh book club in the Groucho, but I bet mine among the ladies of Nightingale House (average age 87) is more fun. By Edwina Currie
