The Spectator Australia

The Spectator is Britain’s oldest and most influential magazine, with incisive political and economic analysis, unrivalled books and arts reviews, and unmissable lifestyle writing, plus the funniest cartoons. It’s more cocktail party than political party, and we’d love it if you joined us.

Snow job

The Spectator Australia

CONTRIBUTORS

AUSTRALIAN DIARY

Bring on 2026! • 2025 was a year best forgotten

A Traveller’s tales • Onerous red tape is killing the magic of movie-making

AUSTRALIAN NOTES

The name’s Allan, James Allan • Never say ‘passed’

Gallows state • The world remains silent to Iran’s horror regime

Fictionomics Awards • Our festive prize for mathematical misinformation

Tucker Qatarlson’s Christmas carol • Not odd of God to choose the Jooz, his son was one

Travels in Transylvania • A land our King, descended from Dracula, says he ‘has a stake in’

The grift that keeps on grifting • Bowen goes international

Trump vs Farage • The politics of restoration

All ye faithful

PORTRAIT OF THE YEAR

DIARY

Ghosts of Christmas Past • Kerry Chikarovski, Bruce Hawker, and the search for a Labor intellectual

Happy new Keir?

THE SPECTATOR’S NOTES

‘I’ve been allergic to AI for a long time’ • Peter Thiel on the dangers of diversity, Trump’s pessimism and the coming Gen Z revolution

Grumpy On Your Birthday

Royal chapter • How Her Majesty is spreading the joy of reading

The best books to give at Christmas — a personal selection by Her Majesty The Queen

‘We’re going for gold’ • Nigel Farage on taking on the Tories, school bullying and admiring Zack Polanski

The year wokery waned

The Great Lie • Don’t listen to those who tell you America is over

MATTHEW AND CAMILA MCCONAUGHEY

ACTRESS’S NOTEBOOK

The pleasure of not knowing

Object lesson • The comet that could be a spaceship

BAROMETER

Drips’ gallery • Parliament’s 20 most insufferable snivellers

HISTORIAN’S NOTEBOOK

Holy spirits • Protestant vs Catholic ghosts

LETTER FROM WASHINGTON D.C.

What’s wrong with discrimination?

WRITER’S NOTEBOOK

Infinite wisdom • An interview with the physicist David Deutsch

Seasonal jeer • The joy of a miserable literary Christmas

What England’s old folk songs can teach us

Swan song • Jung Chang on what the West gets wrong about China

Beneath a Patio Heater, Ambleside

Power to the plebs

We are all George Eliot’s lighted candle

Glib tidings • The sorry demise of the round robin

PLAYWRIGHT’S NOTEBOOK

Wing and prayer • An angel’s for life, not just for Christmas

ASHES NOTEBOOK

A secret life • My lasting friendship with a disgraced MI6 officer

CHRISTMAS NOTEBOOK

The Austen Industrial Complex

Trial and error • How Göring almost escaped justice

Novel uses • The Spectator’s enduring place in fiction

Snobs vs smartphones

The game’s afoot • Why are we still so obsessed with Sherlock Holmes?

LETTERS

BROADCASTER’S NOTEBOOK

Slipshod

Word of the year

Why does Netflix never show us business heroes?

A cause worth dying for • Ian Buruma celebrates the extraordinary courage of the few German patriots who dared to resist Hitler

Adam in paradise

The battle of the brows

Table talk

SPOT THE PLAY TITLE

Poem at the Close of the Year

Streets in the sky

The power of the cartographer

Things that go bump in the night

Flesh and...