Table of contents for 1457 in The Week

“This vile enemy wanted war and it will get war.” So declared Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu this week as his country prepared for a widely expected ground invasion of Gaza. Israel has mobilised 360,000 reservists, many of whom are massed on the border of the Hamas-controlled coastal strip. Fighters from the territory conducted an unprecedented incursion into southern Israel on Saturday, attacking from land, sea and air. They killed more than a thousand Israelis and took at least a hundred more hostage before being driven back by Israeli forces. The dead included at least 260 young partygoers at a music festival and many children and babies. At least 1,500 Hamas fighters were killed, and Palestinian officials say that well over 1,000 people have been killed by massive retaliatory strikes on…

The American dictionary Merriam-Webster has added a raft of slang words to its pages, including “rizz” (meaning romantic appeal or charm), “zhuzh” (a small improvement that completes the overall look), “doggo” (instead of dog), “simp” (a verb, meaning to show excessive devotion to someone or something), and “mid” (neither very good nor very bad). Aspiring girl guides are being encouraged to join “virtual units”, as the organisation struggles with a dearth of adult volunteers. Girlguiding London and South East England said it had offered the opportunity for girls to take part in online activities while it tried to recruit the volunteers needed to allow in-person guiding to the 73,000 girls on its waiting list.…

Amsterdam Royal Nazi: The royal household of the Netherlands has ended decades of speculation about the political leanings of the Dutch king’s grandfather, by confirming the authenticity of a Nazi membership card bearing his name. Prince Bernhard, a German aristocrat who married a Dutch princess, Juliana, in 1937, and was prince consort until 1980, had long been suspected of having been a Nazi sympathiser, but admitted only to having joined two Nazi organisations as a student to help smooth his way through university. “I swear with my hand on the Bible: I’ve never been a Nazi,” he said before his death in 2004. However, the former head of the palace archive in Utrecht, Flip Maarschalkerweerd, revealed last week that he’d found a Nazi membership card dating back to 1933 while…

1 The Only Way is Up by George Jackson and Johnny Henderson, performed by Yazz and the Plastic Population 2 Run to the Hills by Steve Harris, performed by Iron Maiden 3 Shipping Forecast (BBC Radio 4), read by Eugene Fraser 4 I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For by Bono, The Edge, Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen Jr, performed by U2 5 Dizzy by Tommy Roe and Freddy Weller, performed by Vic Reeves and the Wonder Stuff 6 The Gambler by Don Schlitz, performed by Kenny Rogers 7* One Day Like This by Guy Garvey, Craig Potter, Mark Potter, Pete Turner and Richard Jupp, performed by Elbow 8 Rockaway Beach by Dee Dee Ramone, Johnny Ramone, Tommy Ramone and Joey Ramone, performed by Motörhead Book: The Apollo Guidance Computer: Architecture and Operation by Frank O’Brien Luxury: a…

The history of weight-loss medication is a long and sorry tale. Ancient Greek physicians believed obesity was a question of unbalanced humours, to be treated with purgatives and laxatives. King Sancho I of León (c.932-966), aka Sancho the Fat, was treated by the Jewish physician Hasdai ibn Shaprut. It didn’t work; he was regarded as weak-willed because of his obesity, and was deposed. By the early 20th century, tens of thousands of Americans were using dinitrophenol – a toxic compound that causes cataracts and sometimes death – to shed pounds. As many as 25,000 people were blinded by the drug, which was banned for human use. Later, the pharmaceutical industry poured money into diet pills based on amphetamines – until they, too, fell out of favour because they were highly…

Apartment blocks blown apart by bombs; video footage of a teenage boy being “executed” by gunmen – these are the kinds of atrocities you might expect in war-torn Syria, said Peter Wennblad in Svenska Dagbladet (Stockholm). Yet they’re happening right here in Sweden: the country is experiencing a “crisis of violence” that is taking on the characteristics of civil war. Bomb attacks are a regular occurrence: 134 so far this year, up from 90 in all of 2022. Gun violence has soared to levels unheard of in other European states: 62 people died in shootings in Sweden last year, a per capita gun-murder rate roughly 30 times higher than London’s. Things are so bad that the prime minister, Ulf Kristersson, has called in the army to help stop the bloodshed.…

Millions of people are labouring under the false impression that they are allergic to penicillin – and could be missing out on the best treatment for infections as a result, pharmacists have warned. Around four million people in the UK think they are allergic to the antibiotic; but research highlighted by the Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS) suggests that 90% of them are wrong. The drug has side effects such as nausea and diarrhoea, which can be mistaken for an allergic reaction; as can rashes caused by the infection itself. Other people may have had an allergy as children that they have since grown out of. Those wrongly labelled as being allergic may end up being prescribed less effective drugs, which could hinder their recovery, said the RPS. It is urging…

“Life moves fast when you’re Rishi Sunak,” said Helen Pidd in The Guardian. On Tuesday of last week, he insisted that he was not going to be bounced into a quick decision on the future of HS2. Yet 24 hours later, the PM was standing up at the Tory Conference, announcing the cancellation of the high-speed line north of Birmingham. The economic case for the project, he said, had been weakened by changes to business travel post-Covid, and escalating costs. Sunak had also somehow found time to sign off on a 40-page prospectus for a new Network North scheme, paid for with the £36bn thus saved. This listed a series of smaller projects (many of them in the South) to improve transport networks, including £8bn to fix potholes. But it…

“One of the delights known to age, and beyond the grasp of youth, is that of Not Going.”J.B. Priestley, quoted on The Knowledge “Everyone is born 100% ego, and after that it’s just adjustment.”Agnes Martin, quoted on Literary Hub “You can tell the ideals of a nation by its advertisements.”Norman Douglas, quoted in Forbes “All of us labour in webs spun long before we were born.”William Faulkner, quoted in Politico “There are no happy endings. Endings are the saddest part. So just give me a happy middle, and a very happy start.”Shel Silverstein, quoted on NBC4 Washington “The more opinions you have, the less you see.”Wim Wenders, quoted in The Washington Post “If you have to tell people you are powerful, it means you aren’t.”Margaret Thatcher, quoted on Spiked “Every…

To The Daily Telegraph The recent terrorist attacks in Israel have given us two terrible insights, neither of which comes as a surprise. The first is that Hamas, with its random killing of unarmed civilians and use of rape, has no regard for human life. The second is that there are people in the United States, Britain and Europe who defend this behaviour. We have seen what would ensue if Israel were defeated – and we now know that many would be supportive. Dr Jonathan Simon, Shoreham-by-Sea, West Sussex To The Times Notwithstanding the shocking barbarity of Hamas in the past few days, it is about time that our politicians provided a more balanced commentary on the persistent cycle of violence between Israel and the Palestinians. Last year, a UN-sponsored…

Sam & Jak 2 Cricklade Street, Cirencester (01285-704478) “From 2019, and throughout the ravages of Covid”, Sam Edwards and Jak Doggett ran Upton Firehouse, a much-loved barbecue restaurant in a “broad shed” in Burford, says Jay Rayner in The Observer. Last year, they moved to Cirencester, and opened this “unpretentious but beguiling little bistro”. The menu is short and there are some safe options (steak and chips; grilled chicken breast), but there are also flashes of “pizzazz”. Rough-cut trout tartare is mixed with capers and cornichons, and “laid with beads of trout roe that burst, oily and rich, against the roof of your mouth”. Lemon sole slips from the bone “as if it simply can’t wait to get its kit off”, yet “retains bite and tension”. There’s a knowledgeable traditionalism…

Foraging in Sri Lanka Stay 5 nights in a bungalow at the Gal Oya Lodge on ancient land and forage with the last of the Vedda tribe. From £599pp (excl. flights). +94 76 842 4612, galoyalodge.com. Arrive 11 November. Three-night Porto holiday Stay at the Pestana Palácio do Freixo hotel, which boasts stunning views of the River Douro. From £300pp b&b (incl. flights). 020-3368 6345, broadwaytravel.com. Depart 21 November. All-inclusive in Jamaica Enjoy barbecues on the beach and steel drum performances when you stay 7 nights at the luxury Riu Negril. From £1,260pp (incl. flights). 020-3451 2688, tui.co.uk. Depart 31 January 2024. Welsh getaway for eight Spend a week in the beautifully renovated Argall House, which sits in the grounds of an astonishing stately manor house. From £323pp. 0333-888 0205,…

Spotify: turning a page Four years ago, when Spotify’s music business was stagnating, CEO Daniel Ek decided to transform the Swedish streamer into “the everything store for audio”, said The New York Times. First came podcasts. Now Spotify is embracing audio books. It has just announced deals with America’s five biggest publishers, and hundreds of smaller companies, to offer a catalogue of more than 150,000 titles to premium subscribers, starting in the UK and Australia. The move has been welcomed as a challenge to Amazon-owned Audible’s stranglehold on the market. But there’s also concern that Spotify’s plan “could upend the lucrative and growing audiobook business”, which generated global revenues of around $5.4bn in 2022: it apparently wants to charge people for how long they listen to a book, rather than…

Homeland economics vs. free markets Editorial The Economist “Sometimes, in wars and revolutions, fundamental change arrives with a bang. More often, it creeps up on you,” says The Economist. One such “alarming trend” is the drift into protectionist, interventionist “homeland economics”, which has left the presumption of free trade “in the dust”. The pandemic, fragile supply chains, threats to national security and the cost-of-living crisis have all contributed to this government creep. “Central to the new regime is the idea that protectionism is the way to cope with the buffeting.” Yet nothing could be further from the truth. Covid and the Ukraine War have both shown that “markets deal with shocks better than planners do”: they coped with huge swings in supply and demand. The same will be true of…

An under-14s girls’ football team in Cardiff has an unlikely new sponsor, in the form of the US rapper Curtis Jackson – aka 50 Cent. The musician agreed to support AFC Rumney after being approached by a parent of one of the players, who was working on his tour. As part of the deal, the girls will be given a new away kit and tracksuit. “You expect him to say ‘no’ and then when he says ‘yes’, it’s a huge surprise and then you’re massively grateful straight away,” said the team’s coach. An archaeology student taking part in her first dig has found a hoard of coins that are believed to have been hidden by a Scottish clan leader fleeing the Massacre of Glencoe in 1692. Lucy Ankers discovered the…

“A stage-invading protester inadvertently handed Keir Starmer the perfect start to his Labour conference speech,” said Lucy Fisher and George Parker in the FT. After the man dumped a load of glitter over his head – a gesture, it seems, in support of electoral reform – Starmer merely removed his jacket, explained that he and his colleagues had transformed Labour because they wanted it to be a party of “power” rather than “protest”, and got on with his speech. And a very creditable speech it was too, said Juliet Samuel in The Times. Starmer “identified the malaise hanging over the country, the sense of decline, missed opportunities and mounting costs, and tried to offer a sense of optimism”. He promised “to build and invest”, with new infrastructure and mass house-building:…

Naomi Campbell, who is to become the first fashion model to have a V&A show dedicated to her life and career. Opening in June 2024, it will tell her story through 100 outfits she has worn. Wind power, with the news that a turbine on the Dogger Bank windfarm has started sending power to the grid. The site, 81 miles off the coast of Yorkshire, and occupying an area the size of Greater London, will be the world’s biggest offshore farm when it is completed in 2026, with 277 turbines generating enough power for six million homes. Each turbine will be 850ft high. Theatre history, after renovations at a theatre in Norfolk revealed what may be the only surviving stage on which William Shakespeare performed. The timber boards, found under…

Washington DC Repurposed bullets: The US has supplied Ukraine with more than a million rounds of ammunition that its naval forces had seized from fishing vessels in the Gulf. US officials suspect that the 7.62mm calibre rounds, which can be fired from AK-47 rifles, belonged to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, and were being transported to the Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen. Having used a civil forfeiture process to obtain legal ownership of the munitions, the US has now donated them to Ukraine, where they are expected to be deployed in Kyiv’s counteroffensive against Russian positions in the east of the country. Federal funding for Ukraine’s war effort has become a deeply divisive issue in the US. A new package of support for Kyiv, which was announced by President Biden last month,…

“The BBC continues to describe Hamas’s antisemitic murderers as ‘militants’ not ‘terrorists’. The BBC News style guide, in a section entitled ‘Israel and the Palestinians’, says that ‘terrorism is a difficult and emotive subject with significant political overtones and care is required in the use of language that carries value judgements’. This is a reasonable point, but it can’t be true in all cases. It is arguable that when Hamas clashes with Israeli troops over disputed borders this is better described in more neutral words (e.g. ‘Hamas gunmen’), but surely in the present case of racist massacres of unarmed people, the avoidance of the ‘T’ word becomes itself a political statement.” Charles Moore in The Daily Telegraph…

Smile – on this issue Britain comes out top Janan Ganesh Financial Times Those British liberals who like to run down Britain might care to look at an intriguing map of Europe presented by The Economist, says Janan Ganesh. Each country in it was a shade of red denoting the degree of public support for the hard-right. Populist-governed Italy was “Ferrari-red”, as were Poland and Hungary. France, where Marine Le Pen could win the next presidential election, and Germany, where the far-right AfD is polling second, were “a trout-fillet colour”. Spain, Portugal and most of Scandinavia were a shade lighter. But what was most striking was how pale Britain was, a reflection of the puny influence of the hard-right here. You may put this down to our first-past-the-post voting model…

In defence of ultra-processed food In the past few months, ultra-processed foods (UPF) have been blamed for everything from driving up obesity rates to possibly causing depression. But according to a group of scientists and government advisers (some of whom have ties to the food industry), we need to take a more measured approach to the foods. There is, they argued in a briefing at the Science Media Centre, no clear definition of UPFs, meaning that healthy products such as tofu, or baked beans, may fall into the category; and although there is concern about the impact of the emulsifiers and other additives found in UPFs, there is no clear evidence as yet that “processing” in itself renders a food product unhealthy. The more important thing, they say, is the…

The controversial Pink Floyd musician Roger Waters enraged some of his fans by spending an hour reading from his laptop at a recent concert. The London Palladium gig had been billed as an evening in which he’d perform his new version of The Dark Side of the Moon. But before he started, fans had to sit and listen to him reading sections of his unpublished memoir, with 20 minutes devoted to a duck called Donald. Waters then got cross when fans started talking among themselves. “If you want to tell stories,” he said, “tell them in your own time to your own audience in your own f**king theatre.” The magazine supremo Nicholas Coleridge has been appointed provost of Eton College, and he really does seem to love his old school.…

For all that Mikel Arteta has restored hope to Arsenal since becoming the club’s manager in December 2019, there has, until now, been one glaring blot on his CV, said Jason Burt in The Daily Telegraph. In the Premier League, the Spaniard – who spent three years working for Pep Guardiola at Manchester City before arriving at the Emirates – had enjoyed zero success against his former boss. Under Arteta, Arsenal had lost to City seven times in a row – part of a “demoralising” sequence of 12 successive league defeats stretching back to 2017. But finally, at the Emirates on Sunday, the apprentice “outwitted” the sorcerer, said Henry Winter in The Times. Arteta’s men beat Guardiola’s 1-0, with Gabriel Martinelli’s deflected 86th-minute goal proving the difference between the two…

F1 Max Verstappen won his 14th victory of the season at the Qatar Grand Prix on Sunday. The Dutch driver had secured his third straight world title the day before, in the time trial. Football Birmingham have sacked their manager, John Eustace, and are expected to announce Wayne Rooney as his replacement. Rugby England face Fiji in the World Cup quarter-final on Saturday, after beating Samoa 18-17 in their final group game. On Saturday, Wales face Argentina and Ireland play New Zealand.…

Gielgud Theatre, London W1 (0344-482 5151). Until 6 January 2024 Running time: 2hrs 30mins In the spring of 2022, the impresario Cameron Mackintosh presented a triumphant, VIP-studded, one-night-only tribute to Stephen Sondheim, who’d died the previous year, at the West End theatre that bears the composer’s name, said Clive Davis in The Times. Now, that stellar show – featuring 40 of Sondheim’s greatest songs – has returned for a three-month run at the nearby Gielgud Theatre. Co-directed by Matthew Bourne and the Sondheim veteran Julia McKenzie, with “tastefully understated” choreography by Stephen Mear, it’s a very special evening. “If you care about musical theatre, you cannot miss this show.” Subtitled A Great Big Broadway Show, Old Friends is “pure class”, said Patricia Nicol in The Sunday Times – a moving…

Rob turns up at church – he has moved to Penny Hassett and wants Alan to baptise him. Later Alan visits him, and Rob explains his newfound faith. Alan doubts his motives and says he can’t baptise him. Oliver and Lynda notice that Adil is stressed as the Grey Gables relaunch approaches; later, Oliver coaxes a distracted Adil to take a day off. Alan is confronted by Rob’s brother Miles, who persuades him to reconsider. Jazzer and Tracy drive Brad to a university open day; Tracy’s excited but Brad’s lukewarm. He later tells Jazzer he’s considering Felpersham University to be near home but insists it’s not because of Mia; Tracy hates the idea of Brad limiting himself. Eddie and Emma cook up a spooky Halloween plan. On Lynda’s recommendation, Adil…

Paneer and pea fritters Makes about 24 Vegetable oil, to fry 1 tsp cumin seeds 1 onion, finely chopped 150g frozen peas, defrosted 1 green chilli, deseeded and finely sliced 175g gram flour 1 tsp chaat masala 3 tbsp finely chopped coriander leaves 250g paneer, coarsely grated salt and freshly ground pepper To serve: mango chutney lime wedges • Heat 2 tbsp oil in a small frying pan, add the cumin seeds and let them sizzle for a few seconds before adding the onion. Cook for 5-7 mins, until softened, then remove from heat and leave to cool. Preheat the oven to 150°C. • Once cooled, tip the onion mix into a bowl and add the peas, chilli, gram flour, chaat masala and coriander. Stir, and season well. Pour in 200ml water…

• Most charity shops won’t accept baby equipment for safety reasons, but Little Village has a directory of baby banks in need: littlevillagehq.org/uk-baby-banks. • Against Breast Cancer has 800 or so bra banks in the UK, and you can post old bras to its Oxfordshire HQ: againstbreastcancer.org.uk/recycling/bra-recycling. • London Sock company collects old, odd and holey socks, to make into fingerless gloves for homeless people: londonsockcompany.com/amnesty-explained. • Some charity shops – British Heart Foundation, Sue Ryder, larger Oxfam stores, Save the Children, Salvation Army – will take old electrical items. Currys will fix broken tech where possible for resale or charity, and otherwise recycle it. • Hubbub has a donation programme for the digitally excluded and will accept old smartphones. If they don’t work, they will recycle them to extract…

Pat Arrowsmith, who has died aged 93, was for many decades one of Britain’s most prominent and fearless peace campaigners. A co-founder of CND, she helped organise both the first Aldermaston March in 1958, and the Gulf Peace Camp, on the border between Iraq and Saudi Arabia, in 1991. “In between”, said The Daily Telegraph, she handed out leaflets to soldiers serving in Northern Ireland urging them to lay down their weapons; she fasted outside the Russian embassy, in protest against the occupation of Czechoslovakia; and outside the US embassy, in protest against the war in Vietnam. For her fearless interventions, which included climbing onto a Polaris submarine, and crawling into a concrete mixer, she was imprisoned 11 times. She could have avoided some of these sentences by paying fines,…

Caroline Ellison The trial of FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried revved up a gear this week as the prosecution brought its “star witness” to the stand, said The Guardian. Caroline Ellison, 28, Bankman-Fried’s former business partner and girlfriend, was CEO of Alameda Research, the hedge fund accused of misusing billions of dollars syphoned from FTX customers. In testimony, she claimed that Bankman-Fried – with whom she and other executives lived and worked in a large mansion in the Bahamas – “directed” her to commit fraud and send balance sheets to lenders that made Alameda look less risky than it was. She said: “He was the one who set up these systems that allowed Alameda to take the money.” The crypto king’s defence team seems likely to paint Ellison, who has brokered…

“The Middle East region is quieter today than it has been in two decades,” declared the US national security adviser Jake Sullivan on 29 September. Those words “came back to mock him” just eight days later, said The Economist, when Hamas’s horrific assault on Israel sent “shockwaves across the region”. Even before Israel launched its retaliation, the prospect of the two-state solution looked “more distant than ever”. As did Washington’s hopes of being able to turn “away from the Middle East” to focus on “great-power contests” with Russia and China. As for a mooted peace deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia, “arguably the most important Arab state”, that is on hold as a result of Hamas’s actions. The US has spent months trying to broker this “historic rapprochement” between its…

Rwanda will initially take only “small numbers” of deported asylum seekers, the Government told the Supreme Court this week at a three-day hearing to determine the legality of the policy. The Government’s counsel also argued that “key safeguarding elements” had been built into the agreement with Kigali, to ensure the “secure and safe transfer” of asylum seekers. A lawyer representing eight asylum seekers involved in the case countered that migrants sent to Rwanda were at risk of being returned to their home countries, and warned that Rwanda was a “one-party state” in which the torture and murder of opponents was common. The court is expected to rule next month.…

According to a YouGov poll conducted before Labour’s party conference, only 22% of respondents think that Keir Starmer has a clear plan for the country. Among Labour supporters, less than half (47%) do so. However, when business leaders were asked who is “best for business”, for a poll by MHP/Savanta, 45% opted for a future Labour government led by Keir Starmer, and just 32% chose Rishi Sunak’s Conservatives. 41% of people aged 18 to 24 in the UK have used private healthcare, the highest proportion of any age group. Of them, 45% had consulted a private GP. 73% of people in that age group would consider going private, compared with just 52% of over-65s. Public First/Independent Healthcare Provider Network…

Laurence Fox’s target The political journalist Ava Evans has found herself at the centre of a media storm since Laurence Fox referred to her as a pathetic “little woman” on GB News, and asked: “Who’d want to shag that?” One of the hardest things was trying to explain to her father what had happened. “I had to say: ‘Dad, I’m really sorry but this man has said he wouldn’t want to have sex with me, and now a lot of people are talking about it,’” she told Jenny Johnston in the Daily Mail. “He just didn’t get it.” Evans watched Fox’s outburst alone in her flat, tweeted about it, then went to bed. By the next morning, her phone had gone “mad”: there were supportive texts from friends, of course,…

There was chaos on a flight to Taiwan last week, when a foot-long otter and a giant albino rat escaped from a passenger’s hand luggage and roamed through the cabin. “I walked back from the toilet and my friend whispered softly to me, ‘There’s a rat on the plane,’” one passenger recounted on social media. “Pet rat, pet rat,” he said, “it has a white body and it’s not small.’” A flight attendant who tried to catch the rat was bitten, though both it and the otter were eventually bundled into bags. A subsequent search at Taipei airport revealed that 28 live turtles, a marmot, a snake, two otters and other rodents had also been smuggled onto the flight, reportedly by a Chinese passenger. A motorist has been fined for…

Smoking remains the biggest single preventable cause of death, disability and illness in Britain, said The Times. Despite punitive taxes, a ban on smoking in public places, and countless other government measures, about 6.4 million people still smoke in the UK, and the NHS attributes around 76,000 deaths each year to smoking. Now, with his plan to create a “smoke-free generation”, Rishi Sunak has brought a “blast of fresh thinking to a stale and stubborn problem”. At last week’s Conservative Conference, he said he wants to raise the legal smoking age in England – currently set at 18 – by a year every year from 2027. It would mean “that a child who is 14 today could never legally be sold a cigarette”. “If ever a nanny-state policy were designed…

It was a brave move to create a BBC drama out of the story of a vile, predatory paedophile, said Carol Midgley in The Times. But the makers of The Reckoning – a new four-part drama about Jimmy Savile – did a good job. It’s a “respectful, impressive piece of work”, and Steve Coogan is brilliant in the main role. The drama sets out to examine how such a prolific abuser got away with it for so long, said Julia Raeside in The i Paper, and it goes “some way to achieving that” by capturing the way that Savile succeeded in manipulating people. The dramatic sequences are interspersed with testimony from Savile’s victims, which lends the whole thing added power. It’s difficult viewing, but “if it brings us any closer…

After losing to New Zealand by a huge margin in their World Cup opener last week, England would have been desperate to get their campaign “back on track” against Bangladesh on Tuesday, said Mike Atherton in The Times. And this is exactly what Jos Buttler’s men did: they earned a “thumping” 137-run victory against a team that’s troubled them in the past, in the process posting their highest-ever score in an overseas World Cup of 364 for nine. If their standout batsman was Dawid Malan, whose career-best 140 from 107 balls was complemented by half-centuries by Jonny Bairstow and Joe Root, their star performer with the ball was Reece Topley, who “found the kind of late movement that will make him a threat no matter the opposition”. The left-armer finished…

by David Mitchell Michael Joseph 448pp £25 The Week bookshop £19.99 The comedian David Mitchell – “formerly of Peep Show, QI etc.” – is a man who could make a tax manual interesting, said Gerard DeGroot in The Times. He is also a “skilled”, Cambridge-educated historian – and in his latest book, he offers a superlatively entertaining guide to England’s kings and queens, from the Anglo-Saxons to Elizabeth I. This is far from conventional history: Unruly is rant-filled and “gloriously bizarre”. Mitchell breaks off a discussion of William the Conqueror to complain about James Bond being killed off in No Time to Die (“there’s a connection somewhere, but it’s easy to miss”) and likens the Wars of the Roses to “disentangling a very long string of Christmas lights”. But behind…

There was a time when Frans Hals (1582-1666) was remembered as one of the greatest of canonical artists, said Rachel Cooke in The Observer. The Dutch 17th century portraitist was, for instance, a huge influence on the impressionists: Manet “loved him”, as did van Gogh. Yet somewhere down the line, Hals “fell out of favour”, acquiring a reputation for “stodginess” and “sameness”; it may not have helped that his best-known work, including his famous picture The Laughing Cavalier (1624), was characterised by an unfashionable jollity. (Kenneth Clark called him “revoltingly cheerful”.) What’s clear from this new exhibition, however, is that the doubters have been missing out. The show is the first major display of Hals’ art in 30 years, bringing together around 50 of his portraits to showcase quite what…

The Poems of C.P. Cavafy, translated by John Mavrogordato, 1951 (out of print). Love, sex, nostalgia, Hellenism, storytelling, ineffable wisdom. For many years I travelled with Cavafy in my pocket wherever I went. The poems are inexhaustible, and these translations are my favourite. The World As Will and Representation by Arthur Schopenhauer, 1818 (Dover £23.49). The masterpiece of the great German metaphysician and pessimist. I have been reading this off and on for 48 years. I think he got closer to the truth of things than any other philosopher, but I hope he was wrong. It would be nice if the ultimate reality wasn’t just blind, pointless, endlessly striving force. The People’s Act of Love by James Meek, 2005 (Canongate £9.99). No other novel has impressed me as this one…

Programmes Britain’s Housing Crisis: What Went Wrong? Twopart investigation into the housing crisis, talking to politicians, market experts and campaigners to see how things reached this point. Tue 17 Oct, BBC2 21:00 (60mins). Walter Presents: Off Grid Tense Italian drama about a successful CEO who must flee with his family into anonymity when he is accused of murder. Thur 19 Oct, C4 00:30 (55mins). Interview with the Vampire The glossy new adaptation of Anne Rice’s gothic novels continues: Louis takes his first steps to becoming a vampire. (Catch up on iPlayer.) Thur 19 Oct, BBC2 21:00 and 21:45 (45mins each). Films Lady Bird (2017) A teenager navigates first love and family relationships in Greta Gerwig’s coming-of-age comedy-drama set in California. Sat 14 Oct, BBC1 00:10 (90mins). Richard III (1955) Laurence…

Such is the popularity of New Zealand sauvignon blanc, says Susy Atkins in The Daily Telegraph, that it’s easy to overlook “another grape variety which performs excellently in the land of the long white cloud”. Pinot gris – New Zealand’s third most widely planted white grape after sauvignon and chardonnay – is the grape that in Italy is called pinot grigio. But while Italian pinot grigios are often bland, the best New Zealand pinot gris is deliciously creamy in texture and has a wonderful “citrus flourish”. These wines are also a “food matcher’s heaven”: try them with roast pork, creamy chicken pies or rich cheese quiches – or with any type of seafood. Villa Maria Pinot Grigio 2022 (£10.75; Tesco – or £8.99, reduced until 31 October; Waitrose) has the…

Google Maps is easy to use and pretty reliable, based as it is on two decades’ worth of data. Good for long drives in particular, it will suggest a range of routes, and allow you to factor in a lot of stops. Google’s main rival, Apple Maps, has sleek maps, clear tabs and handy links, plus indoor maps for public places and a Flyover function for drone views. It’s linked to Siri for hands-free use; available only on iOS. Waze uses real-time data from users, factoring in accidents, traffic jams, speed cameras and other obstacles. Users can keep track of friends on a trip or spot friends nearby. It needs an active data connection. What3words is useful if you want to be guided to a specific spot. It has divided…

Kentucky’s bourbon trail It went out of fashion for a while in the 1970s, but recent years have seen a revival in enthusiasm for bourbon whiskey – and nowhere more than in Kentucky, its historic home. The state now has 95 distilleries, up from 19 in 2009, and many welcome visitors with tours and tastings, says Emily Bingham in Travel + Leisure. Pick up the “bourbon trail” in Louisville – where the Frazier History Museum examines the drink’s place in the state’s identity – and then head south to the Bardstown distillery, where you can sample bourbon straight from the barrel (this is known locally as “thieving” a taste). Among the other indispensable stops are Heaven Hill, Castle & Key (which has pleasant 19th century gardens laid out by its…

Gordon Jamieson, who has died in Australia aged 102, was one of the last survivors of the so-called Death Railway – a line between Burma and Thailand that was constructed by hundreds of thousands of forced labourers during the Second World War, to boost the Imperial Japanese Army’s supply lines. Most of the labourers were Southeast Asian civilians, but some 60,000 were Allied prisoners of war. Severely malnourished, and working in brutal conditions, at least a fifth of the PoWs died, along with tens of thousands of the civilian labourers. Born in Queensland in 1921, Gordon Jamieson had joined the army aged 19 to “go on an adventure”. He arrived in Singapore with the 2/26th Australian Infantry Battalion in August 1941, and saw action in Malaya (now Malaysia), before being…

Hamas’s attack on Israel raises the question of how the group financed the operation, said Angus Berwick and Ian Talley in The Wall Street Journal. Iran has long been a “primary benefactor”, providing regular funding of around $100m a year. And cash from Palestinian expats and donors is often channelled into Gaza, via Egypt. But “crypto is another string in their bow”, according to Joby Carpenter, a crypto and illicit finance specialist at ACAMS. Analysis by the research company Elliptic suggests that “digital-currency wallets” linked to Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) and their Lebanese ally Hezbollah have received many millions in funds. The PIJ received $93m between August 2021 and June 2023; Hamas is thought to have taken about $41m over the same period. Hamas has been soliciting bitcoin contributions…

The week’s best shares Craneware Investors’ Chronicle This software group helps US hospitals monitor finances, supply chains and labour productivity. Seeing renewed customer interest and strong retention rates after completing its cloud integration. Potential bid target. Buy. £14.90. Halma The Times Shares in the manufacturing group are unjustifiably low, given the reliable earnings stream from niche, regulation-backed markets with high barriers to entry – spanning safety, medical and the environment. Buy. £19.36. Kainos Group Shares Magazine Kainos helps the UK Government and other large organisations implement their digital transformation programmes. Revenues are rising and margins average 15%. Succession worries are overblown. Buy. £11.19. Nordea Bank The Daily Telegraph One of Europe’s safest banks, Nordea lends across sectors throughout the Nordic region. Loved by fund managers for its “reassuringly boring” record…

THE WEEK CROSSWORD 1384 An Ettinger pass holder and two Connell Guides will be given to the sender of the first correct solution to the crossword and the clue of the week opened on Monday 23 October. Send it to The Week Crossword 1384, 121-141 Westbourne Terrace, London W2 6JR, or email the completed grid/listed solutions to crossword@theweek.co.uk. Tim Moorey (timmoorey.com) This week’s winner will receive an Ettinger (ettinger.co.uk) travel pass holder in assorted colours, which retails at £115, and two Connell Guides (connellguides.com). ACROSS 1 What’s left of angel cake? Goodness! (6) 5 Foreign airbase guards very harsh (8) 9 Shake cereal bowl (8) 10 One a long way from the sea in France with growing concerns? (6) 11 Spirited person holds record for violent fiction (12) 13 Amerinds…