World Affairs

Great Lives/Harry Hopkins

Radio 4’s Great Lives can can be very variable. As often as not the subject is some female trail-blazer of whom I have never heard. Yesterday Matthew Parris presented an episode on Harry Hopkins advocated by Jonathan Dimbleby a respected historian of World War Two. Harry Hopkins was the [...]

May 5, 2021 // 0 Comments

That eternal question – what’s the BBC coming to?

I begin my contribution to this organ today by admitting that it is fashionable these days to criticise the BBC. In fact – arguably – it has always been thus, to the point where some veteran Beeb insiders peddle the line that, if on any remotely controversial topic they’re taking [...]

May 2, 2021 // 0 Comments

Then And Now

A few weeks ago a fellow Rust columnist name-checked a British television channel called Talking Pictures TV, founded in 2015, which broadcasts free-to-air vintage films and television programmes and – as I understand it – can be seen via Freeview, Sky and Virgin Media (though I may be [...]

April 30, 2021 // 0 Comments

Women and Sport (continued)

As regular Rusters will be aware, despite being an old-fashioned Neanderthal born in the 1950s, I like to demonstrate my continuing relevance to younger generations by monitoring and occasionally featuring on this organ bulletins from the brave new “woke” world as the “Monstrous [...]

April 28, 2021 // 0 Comments

A win-win for nobody?

Like I suspect many sports fans, over the last few days I’ve been watching developments in football’s European Super League debacle at one remove with something like “rubbernecking” fascination. At one remove because I’m not a particular devotee of football – I’ve never been a [...]

April 21, 2021 // 0 Comments

What’s it all about?

My subject for today – illustrated by two examples – is the vexed one of how the human race copes with life on a planet with finite resources on the one hand and apparently infinite complications upon the other. I grant you that’s a hell of an opening statement but there’s no particular [...]

April 17, 2021 // 0 Comments

That all-important second jab

It so happened that yesterday I joined a very British queue. I’d been rung on Tuesday afternoon by someone from my local GP surgery about my second vaccination jab. I’m sure that every GP surgery, pharmacy, NHS “walk in centre” and other unit involved in rolling out the UK’s vaccination [...]

April 16, 2021 // 0 Comments

Queen Elizabeth and the Spy in the Household/Channel 4

This was a typical Channel 4 documentary- long on revelation, short on evidence for it. The programme made two significant such revelations, namely that the Queen was complicit in the cover up of Anthony Blunt and his immunity from prosecution and, secondly, the spy delivered a hot dossier on the [...]

April 6, 2021 // 0 Comments

Normandy 2021

It is said that “In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king” – and it was certainly true when, as a young teacher on my first assignment, devoid of geography knowledge, I was given a textbook by my headmaster and told that – as long as I stayed one chapter ahead of the pack – [...]

April 4, 2021 // 0 Comments

V2/Robert Harris

Popular historical fiction writer Robert Harris spent the lockdown researching this novel about the V2 rocket. There are two strands to the narrative. The novel begins with a V2 rocket hitting Warwick Court in London where Kay, a reconnaissance analyst for the RAF, is having an affaire with one of [...]

March 30, 2021 // 0 Comments

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Lockdown observations in a full-on day

May 6, 2021 // 0 Comments

I once met a psychiatrist who specialised in geriatrics who opined that character faults were heightened as the person grows older. For ‘growing old’ I would substitute [...]
Great Lives/Harry Hopkins

May 5, 2021 // 0 Comments

Radio 4’s Great Lives can can be very variable. As often as not the subject is some female trail-blazer of whom I have never heard. Yesterday Matthew Parris presented [...]
An art day

May 4, 2021 // 0 Comments

Yesterday I had one of those unexpectedly enjoyable days that start with a disappointment. Polly, Bob Tickler’s P/A was coming down for the day and we were going to meet [...]
It’s complicated (as they say) …

May 4, 2021 // 0 Comments

Being the Rust’s contributing editor on the sport of pugilism, I cannot not claim for myself the privilege of being a particular fan of football. However, it seems to [...]
Roger Alton/fan power

May 3, 2021 // 0 Comments

One of my favourite sporting columns is that of Roger Alton, the former editor of The Observer, in The Spectator. The Spectator has long had a sporting contribution from the [...]