Philip Hensher

Philip Hensher: A cautionary tale of today's customer service

Published: 02 January 2007

One talks to sympathetic voices who can see how ridiculous the whole thing has become

Philip Hensher: The absurdity of handing policy to people's panels

Published: 28 December 2006

What people say they want from criminal policy is a return to hanging and possibly even flogging

Philip Hensher: The fatal childhood addiction to Enid Blyton

Published: 26 December 2006

Probably every voracious reader now between 30 and 60 had exactly that heavy Blyton addiction

Philip Hensher: Lembit, the Cheeky Girl and a Lib Dem conspiracy

Published: 19 December 2006

Ever since Wilson gave the Beatles MBEs, the coming together of politics and celebrity has inspired fear

Philip Hensher: Tell me the one about the bishop and the Irish party

Published: 12 December 2006

'Having a couple of drinks is not a sin', one disconsolate worshipper maintained

Philip Hensher: If only Estelle Morris had learned French

Published: 05 December 2006

I find it worrying that a person who talks as she does was ever thought fit to take charge of education

Philip Hensher: The art of idle curiosity

Published: 01 December 2006

One of the curious features of arts coverage is, surely, the way that the public seems to be drawn to familiar locations and events which are universally agreed to be worth writing about. Outside quite a narrow ring of well-known theatres, sites of interest and the most famous of museums, even first-rate events have to take their chance, depending largely on the idle curiosity of commentators and visitors.

Philip Hensher: If only airports had the glamour of railway stations

Published: 28 November 2006

Railway stations loom so large in the collective imagination it's surprising how neglected they are

Philip Hensher: Cheers! You can trust people after all ...

Published: 21 November 2006

Customers are going to pubs, having a drink, and actually leaving before closing time

Philip Hensher: Dispense the facts, not disapproval

Published: 14 November 2006

Nobody much likes the huge rise in sexual promiscuity, but health policy must live with it

Philip Hensher: What 'The X Factor' really tells us about Britain

Published: 07 November 2006

Gordon Brown should think again whether it presents such an attractive image of modern life

Philip Hensher: A ruthlessly efficient way to ruin people

Published: 01 November 2006

Addiction levels in online gambling are atrociously high - and this is an industry still in its first stages

Philip Hensher: A career that went backwards

Published: 27 October 2006

The obituary writers faced a delicate problem this week, when the travel writer Eric Newby died. There is little disagreement about the qualities of his memorable, vivid and funny early work, such as A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush; similarly, not many people would argue about the quality of his later work. There didn't seem a lot of virtue any more, in the obituary pages, in the old principle of de mortuis nil nisi bonum. The Guardian said: "His later output ... fell markedly away from the exceptional standards he had set with his early work." The Telegraph said bluntly: "Newby's journalism got repetitive and, by the late 1980s, slapdash. People began to hint, and then to say out loud, that he was written out. He may have known this, yet could not stop writing."

Philip Hensher: One small step towards a better policy on the arts

Published: 24 October 2006

If we're going to have a lottery fund for acquisitions, let it be for acquisitions

Philp Hensher: Do not expect lecturers to snitch on their students

Published: 17 October 2006

No threat on earth could justify the Government taking charge of the opinions voiced in our universities

Philip Hensher: The art of breaking down barriers

Published: 10 October 2006

Really, he is issuing an invitation to a gatecrasher who is already in the room

Philip Hensher: In our time, not even sculpture is made to last

Published: 03 October 2006

Antony Gormley's Margate man had a curiously unfinished air, as if waiting for that final act

Philip Hensher: Gated communities are promoting irrational fears

Published: 26 September 2006

If we don't invest in local businesses and travel about in our own cars the end result will look like Sao Paolo

Philip Hensher: Even age can't improve the world's worst novelist

Published: 19 September 2006

It's rare to come across novels as unmitigatedly terrible as Ros's

Philip Hensher: Stay at home with your Stradivarius

Published: 12 September 2006

The international orchestra scene isn't something one regards with a great deal of affection

Philip Hensher: Would a gay player really lower the tone?

Published: 30 August 2006

Manchester City football club has taken a first, cautious step into equality politics. It has signed up for Stonewall's pioneering Diversity Champions scheme, under which employers and groups can develop ways of appealing to and ensuring the trust of sexual minorities. It is the first professional football club to join the scheme, and probably the first to do anything about the subject.

Philip Hensher: Security conspiracy? Don't be so absurd!

Published: 23 August 2006

The authorities have taken an extraordinary step after the arrest of the suspects in the bombing plot. In holding a press conference to detail the evidence against them, they may also have taken a risky one. Already, liberal groups have objected that the press conference may be prejudicial; individual suspects may not even be accused of some of the activities described, and they have the right to be tried individually, for individual offences.

Philip Hensher: Blaming it on sexist prejudice won't wash

Published: 09 August 2006

Mrs Beckett, setting off for her caravanning holiday just at the point when, obviously, nothing in foreign affairs could possibly detain her attention, had a sulky word or two for those cynical persons who do not regard her as an indubitably worthy inhabitant of the office which was once Palmerston's.

Philip Hensher: That's a Hirst? It'll never sell...

Published: 04 August 2006

The Institute of Contemporary Arts has had an interesting idea. In its new show, Surprise, Surprise, it has asked 40 well-known artists to supply work in an unexpected style. Many artists have a particular, distinct manner or characteristic subject that they can be identified by. This exhibition has asked them for work that is different from their characteristic manner.

Philip Hensher: Hop on a train? It's easier to fly abroad

Published: 02 August 2006

This is a small, but I am afraid, horribly familiar story of customer service nowadays. Every week, I travel to Exeter to teach creative writing, usually travelling on Monday morning and coming back to London on Wednesday afternoon or Thursday morning. A month or so ago, I went to Paddington and asked for the same ticket I always get.

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