Phage: The antibacterial arms race
In 1896, Cambridge graduate Ernest Hankin could be seen furiously paddling a small canoe through the Ganges of India. Under a glaring sun, he measured decay in corpses recently consigned to the holy waters. Hankin describes collecting samples from these bodies: fighting off snapping turtles, plungin
No Man’s Land: Inside Women-Only Spaces
The renovated old vicarage in the small Yorkshire village of Horton-in-Ribblesdale is a perhaps unlikely setting for Britain’s only not-for-profit, cooperatively run holiday centre for women and children. But since 1980 the Women’s Holiday Centre (WHC) has been providing a place for wome
Keeping the Memory Alive (and Profitable): The problem of dead artists
There has never been a better or a worse time to be a dead celebrity. In 2012 the annual revenue generated in the USA by dead celebrities was estimated by Forbes at $2.25bn. Their work will remain; their profits are ensured but their legacies are not. After an adulatory obituary and a flurry of resu
On Reading an Evil Book: Reflections on Mein Kampf
Hitler wrote Mein Kampf at the fortress-prison at Landsberg am Lech, a roughly Abingdon-sized town in the Bavarian countryside west of Munich. He had been incarcerated there for his ill-starred attempt to overthrow the Bavarian government in 1923, and, feeling the need to at once set his doctrine do
Window-Shopping for Enlightenment: A Tour around London’s Church of Scientology
“Discover your true potential,” beckoned the golden, beatific faces on the screens lining the building. Rain dribbled, with the occasional whip of wind, as I looked up: “The Church of Scientology” emblazoned in gothic script over a shield. After some pirouetting indecision, and a furtive gla
Rebranding Boredom: How boredom can be a commercial venture
The patient cocks his thumbs out and draws his fists to his chest. Music tinkles in the back of the advert as the camera retreats and he turns, with his penis tucked between his legs, his hands performing a charade of nipples. Other patients flick at a light switch and a fountain of water is [&helli
The Third Culture: Artistic science and scientific art
In the 1920s, the physicist Neils Bohr was redefining the atom. The classical model depicted the atom’s inner space as a nanoscale solar system, with electrons orbiting the nucleus. Yet this metaphor could not explain all the data. Puzzled by his results, Bohr found inspiration in an unlikely plac
“I’ll Show You What a Woman Can Do”: The rise, fall and revival of an ‘Old Master’
In January 2014, an important self-portrait by the Baroque artist Artemisia Gentileschi came up for sale at Christie’s New York. The canvas was the star lot of the auction, with an estimated price of three to five million dollars. Gentileschi was one of the leading artists of the Italian Baroque.
Art on the Seam: Jerusalem’s street art movement
“Art has a very significant role in changing the reality in Israel. We need a much more creative atmosphere to find a creative solution for the problems here”. Matan Israeli, a 35-year-old Jerusalemite is the founder and artistic director of the Muslala project, which was set up in Jerusalem, in