How an influx of eastern European athletes brought British wrestling back from the brink
A 21st-century story of immigration, identity and the Olympic dream.
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Corbyn’s next war
Why using an app to track your sleep could make your insomnia worse
Achieving “good sleep” is becoming a new source of stress, which has been termed “orthosomnia”.
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How Vietnam was America’s avoidable war
We call the Vietnam War a tragedy. But it wasn’t a matter of fate: it was a choice.
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How grime became king
From the Crossways estate in Bow to the Royal Albert Hall, grime music has fought its way to the centre…
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Why we should be wary of using animal behaviour in trying to explain our own
Odd that Jordan Peterson didn’t choose giraffes, for whom most sexual encounters are male-male with penetration.
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In Sylvia Plath’s final letters, Ted Hughes comes across as a monster
The force of the second volume of Plath’s letter comes as Plath vents her fury towards Hughes repeatedly, letter…
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How the decline of the working class made Labour a party of the bourgeois left
Progressive politics in the 1990s turned away from class politics and solidarity in favour of group identities and self-realisation.
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Lewis Goodall’s Left for Dead? asks if Labour can win again
It’s a good question, and one that will define the direction of British politics in the coming decade.
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The lure of getting lost: why mazes draw us in
Mazes are the epitome of a designed environment, of complexity, and yet they seem to emerge from somewhere dark…
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Corbynism 2.0: the radical ideas shaping Labour’s future
After fighting the 2017 election on policies from its social democratic past, the party is now embracing a more…
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Daedalus/Oppenheimer
A new poem by John Sibley Williams.
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The family business: how brothers-in-law Mantegna and Bellini became two of the greatest artists of the Renaissance
The history of art is filled with family relationships: but perhaps the most distinguished is that between brothers-in-law Andrea…
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Is the “deep state” trying to undermine Corbyn?
The denial to me of Commons security clearance and a raft of hostile stories suggests the intelligence services may be…
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The Little Stranger lacks the life that makes a truly great horror film
It’s creepy and claustrophobic, but a depressing and bitter lead (Domhnall Gleeson) robs the film of the electrical charge…
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The adolescent scent of Elon Musk
If lots of people dream of the visionary nature of a Tony Stark, those who really like Elon Musk…
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The revolution starts here: why Killing Eve is the future of television
Creator Phoebe Waller-Bridge really might, after all, be the best thing to happen to women and TV in 45…
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With Killing Eve, has Jodie Comer proved herself the most exciting actor of her generation?
Comer’s turn as Villanelle is a piercing jolt of a performance that hits you like a hairpin to the…
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The National Theatre’s The Prisoner is a moving example of Peter Brook’s “late style”
The playwright’s latest work nods most fondly to two classical texts he is connected with: Oedipus and Hamlet.
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Keynes’s biographer Robert Skidelsky: “I’ve become more and more persuaded by Marx”
The economist and peer on the cost of austerity and how “power structures” limit debate.
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Student culinary habits may be the greatest sign of our generational divide
When I was at university I cooked pasta in a kettle. Today’s students share their carrot and coconut porridge and…
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Commons confidential: Labour’s unlikely peacemaker, John McDonnell
Your weekly dose of gossip from Westminster.
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On the train to Uttoxeter, to have a look at Sting and Trudie’s dining table
“If tables could speak, this one would doubtless have a tale or two to tell.”
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The only caveat to having a roaring coal fire is that you have to buy the Telegraph
The tabloidisation of papers means the Torygraph is the only one big enough to open out and spread against the chimney.
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Letter of the week: John McDonnell’s long march
A selection of the best letters received from our readers this week. Email letters@newstatesman.co.uk to have your thoughts voiced…
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As Labour heads to conference, the scale of John McDonnell’s ambition is becoming clear
The “Corbyn project” could continue without Corbyn as leader but it is harder to imagine it succeeding without the shadow…
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Ben Okri Q&A: “I can’t live without good conversation, or love“
The poet and novelist talks enjoying getting lost, the art of living, and Mandela, Obama and Lincoln.
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Cut-price private schools, Coca-Cola’s special ingredient and free movement, 1930s-style
James Tooley argues that by renting low-cost buildings and cutting out “frills”, private education can be brought within the means of…
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Leader: How modern life conspires to rob us of sleep
New term “orthosomnia” describes the insomnia brought on by paying too much attention to sleep-tracking apps.
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Leader: The Conservatives’ appeasement of Hungary reveals an immoral alliance
The Tories’ refusal to condemn Viktor Orbán’s authoritarian and anti-Semitic government leaves them in no position to lecture Labour.…
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