28 March 2005
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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
Inside Islam's ''terror schools''
Madrasas are Islamic colleges accused by the US of incubating terrorism and the attacks of 9/11. From Pakistan, William Dalrymple investigates the threat
Features
Our man in Blackburn
Paul Routledge meets the ex-ambassador who wants to bring down the Foreign Secretary
Essay
NS Essay - Does sex make us happy? Don't talk about it . . .
Our satisfaction in bed is not rising in relation to the public obsession with open sexuality - in fact, quite the opposite
Regulars
The Politics Column
Politics - John Kampfner tells Labour to stop the silly stunts
Labour's problem is its core support. The danger, according to the polls and the focus groups, remains a refusal to vote rather than a switch to the Tories
Mark Thomas finds torture for sale on the web
The NS uncovered a UK company selling torture equipment worldwide. It was advertising openly on the web - but the government had not even investigated it
Darcus Howe explains a teenage gun crime wave
My son wrote: "Pull out my shot gun ten slugs left in your jaw"
Mark Kermode - Tragic comedy
Woody Allen's latest offers lots to chew on, but leaves us empty, writes Mark Kermode Melinda and Melinda (12A) Maria Full of Grace (15)
Competition
Win vouchers to spend at any Tesco store
Culture
The snore of the crowds
As Billy Elliot: the musical hits the West End stage, hot on the heels of Mamma Mia! and Mary Poppins, a night at the theatre seems more a comfort blanket of familiarity than an adventurous excursion into original art
Simply the best
Visual Arts - The international arts and crafts movement reveals all its beguiling contradictions to Richard Cork
Aye, there's the nub
Amnesia - Michael Coveney on the persistence of a noble theatrical tradition
Theatre
Michael Portillo - Devil woman
Theatre - Ibsen's anti-heroine exercises all her demonic power. By Michael Portillo Hedda Gabler Almeida Theatre, London N1
Television
Andrew Billen - Run for your life
Television - A battle for ratings upstages the fight for survival, writes Andrew Billen Doctor Who (BBC1)
The Fan
The fan - Hunter Davies yearns for the Corinthian spirit
When a player gets sent off, shouldn't we fans get some money back?
Books
Trouble in the ranks. By the time Margaret Thatcher finished with the Conservative Party, the aristocrats had been banished by free-market zealots who made it unelectable. Peregrine Worsthorne laments the demise of the old-style Tories, who at least served to restrain corporate greed
The Strange Death of Tory England Geoffrey Wheatcroft Allen Lane, the Penguin Press, 318pp, £20 ISBN 0713998016
Paradise found
Matisse the Master: a life of Henri Matisse - the conquest of colour, 1909-1954 Hilary Spurling Hamish Hamilton, 512pp, £25 ISBN 0241133394
Here we go
Those Feet: a sensual history of English football David Winner Bloomsbury, 274pp, £14.99 ISBN 0747547386
Ladies' man
Cary Grant: a biography Marc Eliot Aurum Press, 436pp, £18.99 ISBN 1845130731
Two nations
Being Indian: inside the real India Pavan K Varma William Heinemann, 217pp, £17.99 ISBN 0434013919
Elusive thoughts
Emotional Rollercoaster: a journey through the science of feelings Claudia Hammond Fourth Estate, 417pp, £15.99 ISBN 0007164661
Secret self
26a Diana Evans Chatto & Windus, 230pp, £12.99 ISBN 0701177969
