Saturday 16th August 2025

Culture

Beyond the binary: Leigh Bowery’s radical individuality

Tate Modern's "Leigh Bowery!" refuses easy categorisation—much like its subject A fashion student from Sunshine, Melbourne, rocks up to London in 1980, writes 'wear makeup everyday' on his New Year's...

St Anne’s goes All-Steinway: A purposeful and bold commitment to music

In a move that lives up to its motto of ‘Consulto et Audacter’ (purposefully...

Just like the movies: An American’s notes on her Oxford year

Oxford occupies a mystical, almost fantastical place within the American psyche – so much...

Reading Oxford books in Oxford

For those who have not even set foot in Oxford, the city still lives...

Fresh old stuff that hurts in the right places

New period drama forces us to rethink what we want from history.

Comfort Films: A Good Year

A charming British Rom-Com set in the idyllic Provence countryside, what more could you want? Sign me up, sign yourself up, sign everyone up....

Returning to my favourite play: Dancing at Lughnasa

If we’re not watching Saoirse Ronan star in her latest feature film, we’re quoting Derry Girls from memory or fetishing Connell’s chain and fan-girling...

Friday Favourite: David Harsent

There is something about poetry that makes it more potent than fiction in times of need. With its raw, brash and yet strangely beautiful...

Hard Pressed

Why do I need to pick those flowers that are screaming, “I am alive!” to kill between the pages of a heavy book?

Movement

The energy in the trees was palpable- at once pulsating and swirling

Conversations with my Lover

The fat little curves of cats’ bellies, and stiff white peaks of egg.

Personal History

You want to understand how someone could be two people. Why you failed to recognise it at the time.

You

Regaining my youth only means losing you all over again.

At the Station

A laugh into the silence, a step into the stillness, and a single breath seems to make the station tremble.

En Attendant

So sit on the roof and watch remotely The wind that makes the spires dance there, slowly

round

of feeling directional

Now That’s What I Call… Poetry?

Somebody once told me there are a lot of bad song lyrics out there. Imagine, for every subtle, elegant song you hear, there’s bound...

‘Normal People’ of Oxford

Those who have not yet seen the BBC Three series Normal People might be forgiven for wondering what the fuss is about. The 12-part...

The Sheldonian

That is the beauty of the concert. Music threading its way in and out of the thoughts of a hundred vague spirits in the audience.

Unterwegs

So let us meet at the station, then, and what happens after we can decide again

Affairs

like landmines or arms holding someone they love

The Muse in Film: Winona Ryder and Tim Burton

When Winona Ryder first met Tim Burton, they talked like old friends about movies and music for over half an hour before realising that...

Murakami’s ‘Killing Commendatore’: where art can transport you

Murakami’s Killing Commendatore got me thinking about art within literature. We can easily find examples of literature within art: Shakespeare’s Hamlet in Millais’ Ophelia,...

Ping-pong

Stupid rules are still rules

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