26 September 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
Vote Brown: get Blair!
The activists are waiting in vain: there is no left turn ahead. If Gordon Brown's record to date is any guide, his premiership could be more Blairite than Blair himself
Features
Selling torture in London's Docklands
It cost £4m to police the DSEi arms fair, but only a known troublemaker (right) could spot who was really breaking the law. By Suspect H (aka Mark Thomas)
Chechnya all over again
Dagestan, with two million inhabitants from 37 ethnic groups, as well as access to oil, has been seen as a sanctuary by terrorists. It's a disaster waiting to happen
Are all men rapists after all?
British rape figures, already shocking, peak in the heavy-drinking party season. Why? Because this is a crime of opportunity - and many men will take their chance, argues Kira Cochrane
A chav-free espresso, please
It's not their corporate blandness we need to worry about, but the way that the coffee-bar chains reinforce existing social distinctions, observes Joe Moran
Regulars
The Politics Column
The politics column - Martin Bright on the stampede for the centre
What we are witnessing is a stampede for the centre right of British politics . . . and it is evident that few of the fresh ideas are coming from the left. By Martin Bright
Lindsey Hilsum - explores an illusory Iraq
Iraqis have as many illusions as Bush about their country, like children closing their eyes and saying, "You can't see me"
Competition
Win vouchers to spend at any Tesco store
Culture
Give it to us sexy, shiny, and in public!
The Stirling Prize for Architecture is ten years old. What sort of buildings has it rewarded, and what has it ignored? Giles Worsley assesses this most maverick of the arts gongs
What's in No 19 Princelet Street?
Museums - A former sanctuary for refugees hopes to become Europe's first Museum of Immigration. Sebastian Harcombe is entranced
Tom Sutcliffe - Behind the scenes
Opera - Crucifixes and Christmas chic overwhelm Verdi and Nielsen, writes Tom Sutcliffe Don Carlos Welsh National Opera, Cardiff Maskarade Royal Opera House, London WC2
Kathy Lette - Engage the enemy
Women fight an unequal battle in a sparkling new adaptation, writes Kathy Lette Pride and Prejudice (U)
Television
Andrew Billen - Sketch artists
Television - The best comedy mixes sex with class, race and Bovril. By Andrew Billen Tittybangbang (BBC3) Swinging (Channel 5)
The Fan
The fan - Hunter Davies needs a lift to the game
When Saturday comes, the lady wife becomes my best friend
Books
True stories. Have you ever wondered who the Franks were, or failed to distinguish the Habsburgs from the Hohenzollerns? A children's book written 70 years ago answers these and many other questions. Margaret Drabble takes a charming tour through the past
A Little History of the World E H Gombrich; translated by Caroline Mustill Yale University Press, 304pp, £14.99 ISBN 0300108834
Broken promises. By delivering a softer, more socially inclusive version of Thatcherism to Middle England, Tony Blair earned the adulation of his party. Where did it all go wrong, wonders David Marquand
The Unfulfilled Prime Minister: Tony Blair and the end of optimism Peter Riddell Politico's, 226pp, £15.99 ISBN 1842751131
Offshoots
Bamboo: non-fiction 1978-2004 William Boyd Hamish Hamilton, 650pp, £20 ISBN 0241143055
Great dames
Chin Up, Girls! A book of women's obituaries from the Daily Telegraph Edited by Georgia Powell and Katharine Ramsay John Murray, 362pp, £16.99 ISBN 0719563003
Back to the womb
Days From a Different World: a memoir of childhood John Simpson Macmillan, 413pp, £18.99 ISBN 1405050047
Silly old mum
Confessions of a Bad Mother Stephanie Calman Macmillan, 307pp, £12.99 ISBN 1405051922
Fiction - The weight of history
Shalimar the Clown Salman Rushdie Jonathan Cape, 398pp, £17.99 ISBN 0224061615
A fine little man
My Lives Edmund White Bloomsbury, 356pp, £17.99 ISBN 0747575223
The limits of liberalism
Faculty Towers: the academic novel and its discontents Elaine Showalter Oxford University Press, 166pp, £12.99 ISBN 019928332X
