11 h. ago The soldier of fortune who Mugabe's thugs threatened to feed to the crocodiles: RICHARD KAY reflects on the extraordinary life of ex

As news of his sudden demise, aged 72, swept through London 's military clubland yesterday, some of his old comrades could not help wondering whether his death with his past catching up with him.

Events

4 d. ago The Extraordinary Miss Flower review – secret life exposed through treasure trove of love letters

Nick Cave and Richard Ayoade are among those reading out the posthumously discovered missives that inspired an album by Emilíana Torrini, who soundtracks this gorgeous filmYou’d be forgiven for not having heard of Geraldine Flower, the subject of A new film from artists Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard, the pair behind the 2014 Nick Cave documentary 20,000 Days on Earth. (Cave makes an appearance here reading a letter or two.) Flower was not famous in her lifetime and in fact, after watching the film we’re none the wiser about how she spent her later years. But when she died in 2019, a suitcase packed with hundreds of love letters written to her by smitten men in the 60s and 70s was found in her London flat.The letters inspired a 2024 album by Icelandic singer-songwriter Emilíana Torrini (called Miss Flower) and also this intriguing, gorgeous and creative documentary – a film somewhere between an installation with songs and an extended music promo. It features Torrini and her band perf...

Politics

5 d. ago The Stockport Pyramid's grand transformation from corporate office into lavish restaurant in 50 brilliant pictures

It has been brought 'back to life' in extraordinary fashion

Society

1 week ago Where Dragons Live review – reflections on family life in an extraordinary setting

In this warm documentary, three siblings clear out their enormously grand childhood home in Oxfordshire where among the happy memories are those of crueltyThis warm, gentle documentary from Suzanne Raes is about a family – and a family home – that might have interested Nancy Mitford or Wes Anderson. Maybe it takes a non-British film-maker to appreciate such intense and unfashionable Englishness; not eccentric exactly, but wayward and romantic. It is about a trio of middle-aged siblings’ from the Impey family who take on the overpoweringly sad duty of clearing out their enormously grand childhood home in Oxfordshire. The huge medieval manor house Cumnor Place, with its dozens of chimneys, mysterious rooms and staircases was bought by their late mother, the neuroscientist Jane Impey (née Mellanby), with the proceeds of the sale in 1966 of a postcard-sized but hugely valuable painting, Rogier van der Weyden’s Saint George and the Dragon.Impey died in 2021 and her husband, author and an...

Society

2 w. ago Adventurer, horse photographer, killer: Eadweard Muybridge’s extraordinary life told in a comic book

He is famed for being a pioneer of the moving image – but there was so much more to Muybridge than that. The great graphic novelist Guy Delisle explains why he turned his life into a rollicking readIt was one of the biggest talking points of the 19th century: whether a galloping horse lifted all four hooves off the ground simultaneously. Painters struggled with the notion, often wrongly depicting the animals doing a sort of leap, their limbs outstretched front and back. Then, in the 1870s, the great British adventurer Eadweard Muybridge closed the debate, devising photography with quick enough exposure times to isolate the horses in motion – and airborne.“Lots of people didn’t accept it,” says Guy Delisle. “When they saw a photograph of the horse gathering its hooves, they said it looked like a dead spider. But when the photographs were projected in sequence, they said, ‘It’s true!’” Continue reading...

Events

3 w. ago Kyren Wilson: ‘It’s not just me that’s world champion. It’s my whole family’

The 2024 winner reflects on the emotional backstory to Crucible triumph amid major health concerns for his family“‘I still believed in myself but it was quite soul-destroying out there,” Kyren Wilson says in a back room at Barratts Snooker Club in Northampton. The world champion once worked here as a barman because he had lost his place on tour after his first season as a professional in 2011. He was still only 19 and he had little idea that an avalanche of adversity would engulf him in the years ahead.Wilson begins the defence of his world title, with a first-round match against Lei Peifan, in the venerable Crucible in Sheffield on Saturday morning. But it seems fitting that we should meet here, in the unpromising surroundings which once defined Wilson’s life, as he describes his extraordinary world championship backstory. Continue reading...

Politics

3 w. ago Melinda French Gates has led an extraordinary life. This self

Bill Gates’ ex-wife might have taken the high road, but she’s mistaken what readers really want: gossip

Politics

3 w. ago The Determined Spy: Frank Wisner, the CIA and a covert career cut short

New biography tells story of operative who directed coups in Iran and Guatemala and grappled with mental illnessFrank Wisner was a leading light of the early CIA, a director of clandestine operations who came of age in the second world war then fought the cold war by fair means or foul, from funding American cultural outreach to orchestrating coups in Iran and Guatemala.Before becoming a biographer, Douglas Waller reported for Newsweek and Time. His new book, The Determined Spy, is about Wisner, a man who lived an extraordinary life but came to be buried at Arlington national cemetery, under a simple headstone, identified merely as a commander in the US naval reserve. Continue reading...

Politics

4 w. ago Gavin & Stacey's Larry Lamb on how show made him 'more bearable to be around'

Larry said the hit show was the "most extraordinary experience" of his life

Politics

4 w. ago Larry Lamb says Gavin & Stacey changed his personality and it's a 'relief' it's over

Larry said the hit show was the "most extraordinary experience" of his life

Politics

last month Diaries reveal extraordinary story of Sanquhar soldier's life on World War One frontline

The Sanquhar Boys and the Seaforths feature the personal diaries of Private John Hope.

Events