Latest Stories
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Wow! Facebook introduces five emoji reactions
After years of promises, Facebook has finally updated its status reactions with five emoji-inspired buttons. Are we losing our ability to communicate effectively?
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A ‘New Day’ dawns as the Independent falls
Last week the opinionated Independent announced the closure of its print edition. Now, a new ‘politically neutral’ newspaper is entering the fray....
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War and Peace: ‘greatest drama of the decade’
After six lavish episodes, the BBC’s War and Peace is already being called the best TV show of the year — perhaps even the last ten years. But can...
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Dictionary’s ‘sexist’ examples prompt row
Rabid feminists, nagging wives: an anthropologist has accused the Oxford English Dictionary of publishing misogynistic examples. Is he right? How can a dictionary be sexist, anyway?
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New Holocaust memoir storms bestseller charts
On April 13 1944, accompanied by her Polish-born father, Marceline Loridan-Ivens was deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau from Paris. She was 16 at the time. Now she has written him a love letter.
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Bowie: chameleon, banker, videogamer, genius
Celebs, writers, world leaders, ordinary fans: the world has come together to mourn David Bowie’s death. What made him so great? Was he a brilliant artist — or is the truth more complicated?
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The app that helps women stop saying sorry
Thousands of women are making a New Year’s resolution to stop saying sorry at work — and a new app is here to help them. Why do women apologise more than men? And should they stop?
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Rags to riches: the boy who scored 1009 runs
On Tuesday, a penniless schoolboy smashed a 117-year-old cricket record. His achievement revived the age-old tale of the humble hero who makes good. Why do such success stories fascinate us?
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2016: the votes, a Bard and an Olympic summer
It is the Chinese Year of the Red Fire Monkey. Pope Francis has declared it a ‘year of mercy’. And the UN celebrates the ‘International Year of Pulses’. But how will we look back on 2016?
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New Star Wars premieres as fans debate meaning
The British premiere of Star Wars: The Force Awakens hits London this evening. The series has become a global phenomenon — but is it any more than...
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2015 in culture: Women narrow the gender gap
Adele, J-Law, the Turner Prize: 2015 was a bumper year for women in culture. Is it time we acknowledged that there’s no difference between male and female artists?
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Biographer: ‘we need Dickens more than ever’
This Christmas, a new TV drama will bring together Charles Dickens’s most beloved characters. It’s about time, says his biographer. Can art really change people’s minds?
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Hollywood bidding war over Christmas Carol
Universal Pictures has won a four-studio battle over the rights to Humbug, and has cast Ice Cube to star as Scrooge. What can today’s audiences learn from Dickens’s Victorian story?
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Hitler’s murder manifesto to be re-published
Mein Kampf, the book which outlined the Nazis’ racial theories, will be published in Germany for the first time since 1945. But should access to Hitler’s genocidal ramblings be restricted?
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‘Nazi’ adverts pulled from New York subway
New York didn’t take too kindly to seeing its trains decorated in fascist symbols. Why were they there? And can we learn much from imagining a world in which America is ruled by Nazis?