Category: Access

Britain has a new prime minister by the name of Theresa May.  In and of itself this may not be reason enough for jubilation, but last week the new leader appointed a cabinet that was considerably stronger than what many, myself included, had been expecting.  No fewer than four leaders of the Leave EU movement in parliament received ministerial portfolios, most remarkably Boris Johnson, who became Foreign Secretary; David Davis was given a new post of Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union; and a similarly novel position created in the wake of the referendum, that of Secretary of...

  In a writer’s life it sometimes happens that no sooner does he put a thought in words than chance sends him fresh evidence to substantiate it, a kind of souvenir acknowledgement in tacit confirmation of what he had been thinking.  So it happened last week.  No sooner had I posted my musings on football than chance spirited me away to a place called Enna, a mountain townlet in the middle of Sicily, where, of all places, an international piano competition, with my wife among the jurors, was to take place.  Free lodging, free grub, and free air at temperatures...

  Chess is the only sport I ever understood, recognized, and followed, because, unlike spectator sports, I thought it a complex yet coherent model of human conflict.  It was never clear to me what lesson one could glean from rugby or water polo, for instance, except that perseverance and endurance win over irresolution and apathy.  But this is like saying that it is better to be clever, rich, and healthy than stupid, poor, and sick – not much of a lesson there, as most people would probably agree. This week, however, I was watching football – soccer, a spectator sport...

It was like something out of Plutarch.  Nature and history commingled in the chronicle of an epochal event, as torrential rains over London and much of the southwest of England began in the early hours of last Thursday. I had seen it start here in Sicily the night before, a downpour so severe we kept losing power, and I waved to the thunderstorm in benediction as it rumbled off to the north, northward and westward, Albionward.  Bad weather is always good for our side when there is a close contest, because as a rule those in the right own umbrellas...