Best of the Spectator

The Book Club: Hadley Freeman

The Book Club will return next week! In the meantime we are revisiting Sam’s conversation from 2020 with Hadley Freeman whose book House of Glass tells the story of 20th century jewry through the hid…

00:34:25 | Wed 10 Jan 2024

Americano: Do Trump’s Republican rivals have any hope?

Freddy Gray is joined by pollster James Johnson, co-founder of JL Partners. They speak about the upcoming Iowa caucuses, the New Hampshire primary, and whether Trump’s opponents have any chance of be…

00:23:12 | Tue 09 Jan 2024

Chinese Whispers: What lies at the root of the India-China rivalry?

India is the fifth largest economy in the world, and now has a population larger than China’s. It’s no surprise, then, that officials in Washington often see India as a powerful non-western bulwark t…

00:45:06 | Mon 08 Jan 2024

Why Sturgeon’s trans bill threatens women

Julie Bindel speaks to law academic, Michael Foran who is based at the University of Glasgow. Michael played a key role campaigning against Nicola Sturgeon who attempted to push through the Gender Re…

00:35:17 | Sun 07 Jan 2024

Spectator Out Loud: Svitlana Morenets, James Heale and Theo Hobson

This week: Svitlana Morenets explains why Ukrainians can't trust Putin's hollow promises (00:57), James Heale reads his politics column on Rishi's January blues (05:42), and Theo Hobson describes the…

00:16:37 | Sat 06 Jan 2024

Americano: has Claudine Gay wrecked Harvard?

For the first Americano episode of 2024, Freddy Gray is joined by Peter Wood, President of the National Association of Scholars to discuss Claudine Gay's resignation from Harvard University. On the p…

00:39:47 | Fri 05 Jan 2024

The Edition: Putin’s ‘peace’ is a partitioned Ukraine

On the podcast:

In his new year’s address this year Vladimir Putin made no mention of the war in Ukraine – despite missile strikes over the Christmas period – and now Owen Matthews reports in The Spec…

00:51:56 | Thu 04 Jan 2024

The Book Club: Anne Applebaum

The Book Club is taking a brief Christmas break, so we have gone back through the archives to spotlight some of our favourite episodes. This week we are revisiting Sam's conversation from 2017 with t…

00:25:00 | Wed 03 Jan 2024

Table Talk: Philip Hensher

Philip Hensher is a novelist and regular contributor to The Spectator’s books pages. His books cover a variety of subjects and often deal with important historical change, such as the fall of the Ber…

00:30:42 | Tue 02 Jan 2024

The Book Club: Robert Webb

The Book Club is taking a brief Christmas break, so we have gone back through the archives to spotlight some of our favourite episodes. This week we are revisiting Sam's conversation from 2017 with R…

00:26:19 | Wed 27 Dec 2023

Women With Balls: Susan Hall

Susan Hall is a born and bred Londoner running for one of the most important jobs in the city. After leaving school at 18 she had dreams of being a mechanic and struggled to get into technical colleg…

00:31:43 | Fri 22 Dec 2023

The Book Club: Speeches that shape the world

The Book Club is taking a brief Christmas break, so we have gone back through the archives to spotlight some of our favourite episodes. This week we are revisiting Sam's conversation from 2017 with P…

00:27:25 | Wed 20 Dec 2023

Defending science from ‘cancel culture’

Freedom of speech is one of the fundamental tenets of a liberal democracy, and yet threats to freedom of speech today don’t so much come from authoritarians abroad as they do from within. The idea of…

00:27:03 | Tue 19 Dec 2023

Table Talk: Michel Roux Jr

Michel Roux Jr. is an English-French chef and is the chef patron of Le Gavroche, the first restaurant in the UK to received one, two and then three Michelin stars. Earlier this year it was announced …

00:28:52 | Tue 19 Dec 2023

Spectator Out Loud: Peter Hitchens, Lionel Shriver, Mary Wellesley and more

On this week's episode, Peter Hitchens remembers a Christmas in Bucharest, Lionel Shriver says people don't care about Ukraine anymore, Ed West wonders if you can ‘meme’ yourself into believing in Go…

00:30:31 | Sat 16 Dec 2023

The Edition: Christmas Special 2023

Welcome to this festive episode of the Edition podcast, where we will be taking you through the pages of The Spectator’s special Christmas triple issue.

Up first: What a year in politics it has been.…

01:11:53 | Thu 14 Dec 2023

The Book Club: Pen Vogler

My guest in this week's Book Club podcast is the food historian Pen Vogler, author of the new Stuffed: A History of Good Food and Hard Times in Britain. Pen tells me how crises have affected British …

00:44:58 | Wed 13 Dec 2023

Chinese Whispers: who will be Taiwan's next President?

Taiwan goes to the polls in just over a month. This is an election that could have wide repercussions, given the island’s status as a potential flashpoint in the coming years.

The incumbent President,…

00:42:57 | Mon 11 Dec 2023

Spectator Out Loud: James Heale, Michael Simmons and Mary Wakefield

This week: James Heale reads his politics column on Sunak's migration minefield (00:55), Michael Simmons says that Scotland's 'progressive' teaching methods have badly backfired (05:53), and Mary Wak…

00:17:46 | Sat 09 Dec 2023

Women With Balls: Jacqui Smith

Jacqui Smith was born in Malvern, where she joined the Labour party aged 16. After graduating from Oxford, Jacqui moved to London and worked briefly as a parliamentary researcher but trained to be a …

00:33:55 | Fri 08 Dec 2023

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