The history of modern warfare suggests that leaders who are ruthless towards failing ministers and generals are best able to keep their armed forces innovative on the battlefield. What Zelensky must learn from war leaders past | Peter Caddick-Adams engelsbergideas.com/essays/what-...

What Zelensky must learn from war leaders past

The history of modern warfare suggests that leaders who are ruthless towards failing ministers and generals are best able to keep their armed forces innovative on the battlefield.

engelsbergideas.com

Who knows what tomorrow holds for the herring, a fish that has cut such a bright trail through history? An ode to the humble herring | @mathewlyons.bsky.social engelsbergideas.com/reviews/an-o...

An ode to the humble herring

Who knows what tomorrow holds for herrings and the fleets that chase them, but what a bright trail the silver darlings have cut through history.

engelsbergideas.com

The rise in the number of classical music festivals testifies to a growing demand for the timeless beauty of the western musical canon, especially among the young. Classical music’s enduring allure | Elisabeth Braw engelsbergideas.com/notebook/cla...

Classical music's enduring allure

The rise in the number of classical music festivals testifies to a growing demand for the timeless beauty of the western musical canon, especially among the young.

engelsbergideas.com

Whoever comes out on top in the bitter clash between the country's political dynasties, it is ordinary Filipinos who will pay the price. The cost of the Philippines’ clan politics | Imran Shamsunahar engelsbergideas.com/notebook/the...

The cost of the Philippines' clan politics

Whoever comes out on top in the bitter clash between the country's political dynasties, it is ordinary Filipinos who will pay the price.

engelsbergideas.com

At the heart of Europe’s crisis is a neglect of the common good and the prerogatives of the state. My latest for @engelsbergideas.bsky.social — Europe’s lost reason of state:

Engelsberg Ideas@engelsbergideas.bsky.social · 3d ago

At the heart of Europe’s crisis is a neglect of the common good and the prerogatives of the state. Europe’s lost reason of state | @jackfdickens.bsky.social engelsbergideas.com/notebook/eur...

At the heart of Europe’s crisis is a neglect of the common good and the prerogatives of the state. My latest for @engelsbergideas.bsky.social — Europe’s lost reason of state:

Engelsberg Ideas@engelsbergideas.bsky.social · 3d ago

At the heart of Europe’s crisis is a neglect of the common good and the prerogatives of the state. Europe’s lost reason of state | @jackfdickens.bsky.social engelsbergideas.com/notebook/eur...

At the heart of Europe’s crisis is a neglect of the common good and the prerogatives of the state. Europe’s lost reason of state | @jackfdickens.bsky.social engelsbergideas.com/notebook/eur...

Europe’s lost reason of state

At the heart of Europe’s crisis is a neglect of the common good and the prerogatives of the state.

engelsbergideas.com

It was in the Army of Africa that the future dictator fashioned his ill-defined vision of Spain's grandeur, and of his own destiny to salvage it. Franco’s formative years in Spanish Morocco | @chountisdefabbri.bsky.social engelsbergideas.com/notebook/fra...

Franco's formative years in Spanish Morocco

It was in the Army of Africa that the future dictator fashioned his ill-defined vision of Spain's grandeur, and of his own destiny to salvage it.

engelsbergideas.com

The war in Iran is likely to accelerate a trend already underway in the Gulf: multi-alignment and strategic hedging. Why the Gulf states won’t side with America | Yoel Guzansky and Jesse R. Weinberg engelsbergideas.com/notebook/why...

Why the Gulf states won't side with America

The war in Iran is likely to accelerate a trend already underway in the Gulf: multi-alignment and strategic hedging.

engelsbergideas.com

Faced with a more transactional and unilateral presidency in Washington, western nations are forging new partnerships to steward the US-led world order through geopolitical turbulence. How America’s allies can preserve the West | @wdjames.bsky.social engelsbergideas.com/notebook/how...

How America's allies can preserve the West

Faced with a more transactional and unilateral presidency in Washington, western nations are forging new partnerships in an effort to steward the US-led world order through a time of geopolitical turb...

engelsbergideas.com

🎧The EI Podcast: The alien world of Homer’s Odyssey Classicist and actor Orlando Gibbs speaks to Alastair Benn about the strangeness of this ancient epic. engelsbergideas.com/podcast/the-...

The alien world of Homer’s Odyssey

The EI Podcast brings you weekly conversations and audio essays from leading writers, thinkers and historians. Hosted by Alastair Benn and Paul Lay. Find the EI Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or ...

engelsbergideas.com

My new essay on Japan’s nostalgic prime minister

Engelsberg Ideas@engelsbergideas.bsky.social · last wk.

Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi wants to raise Japan’s game. But, given her reputation as a pioneer, she is remarkably backward-looking. Nostalgia hinders Takaichi’s vision for Japan | @billemmott.bsky.social engelsbergideas.com/essays/nosta...

Christopher Nolan’s Odysseus is not the trickster of the Homeric poems. Orlando Gibbs explains why. 🎧The EI Podcast: The alien world of Homer’s Odyssey audioboom.com/posts/893414...

The second Trump administration is defined by centralised power and a hubristic pursuit of personal legacy. Inside Trump’s American regime change | Matthew Hefler and John Sipher engelsbergideas.com/reviews/insi...

Inside Trump's American regime change

The second Trump administration is defined by centralised power and a hubristic pursuit of personal legacy.

engelsbergideas.com

The fountain pen is among the most personal of our creative technologies. Its retreat from daily life is a tragedy. The lost magic of the fountain pen | Benjamin Rhode engelsbergideas.com/notebook/the...

The lost magic of the fountain pen

The fountain pen is among the most personal of our creative technologies. Its retreat from daily life is a tragedy.

engelsbergideas.com

The great virtuoso gives a near-definitive performance of Beethoven's three final piano sonatas. Mitsuko Uchida’s divine Beethoven | @paullay.bsky.social engelsbergideas.com/notebook/mit...

Mitsuko Uchida's divine Beethoven

The great virtuoso gives a near-definitive performance of Beethoven's three final piano sonatas.

engelsbergideas.com

Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi wants to raise Japan’s game. But, given her reputation as a pioneer, she is remarkably backward-looking. Nostalgia hinders Takaichi’s vision for Japan | @billemmott.bsky.social engelsbergideas.com/essays/nosta...

Nostalgia hinders Takaichi's vision for Japan

Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi wants to raise Japan’s game. But, given her reputation as a pioneer, she is remarkably backward-looking.

engelsbergideas.com

The world-beating British choral tradition, now under threat, is infinite in variety and blessed in its capacity for renewal. A choral tradition without equal | Benjamin Poore engelsbergideas.com/reviews/a-ch...

A choral tradition without equal

The world-beating British choral tradition, now under threat, is infinite in variety and blessed in its capacity for renewal.

engelsbergideas.com

During the great conflicts of the 20th century, Russia and Germany waged a bitter struggle for control of the Baltic Sea and its surrounding territories. The Russo-German struggle for a Baltic empire | Peter Haldén engelsbergideas.com/essays/the-r...

The Russo-German struggle for a Baltic empire

During the great conflicts of the 20th century, Russia and Germany waged a bitter struggle for control of the Baltic Sea and its surrounding territories, forcing profound transformations in the region...

engelsbergideas.com

🎧 The EI Podcast: How wine made the modern world Historian Kathleen Burk speaks about humanity’s ancient relationship with wine. engelsbergideas.com/podcast/how-...

How wine made the modern world

Historian Kathleen Burk speaks to Max Mitchell about the long history of humanity's relationship with wine.

engelsbergideas.com

Kathleen Burk on how the Dutch were the driving force behind the cultivation of wine in Bordeaux and the Loire Valley. 🎧The EI Podcast: How wine made the modern world audioboom.com/posts/893154...

A few decades ago, the strange sounds and emotions of Mahler's music were a rare treat. Now they are almost routine. The rise and rise of Gustav Mahler | Richard Bratby engelsbergideas.com/notebook/the...

The rise and rise of Gustav Mahler

A few decades ago, the strange sounds and emotions of Mahler's music were a rare treat. Now they are almost routine.

engelsbergideas.com

British commanders are still trained to prize the flash of intuitive brilliance. In an age of AI and autonomous systems, that instinct may prove actively regressive. The age of the genius general is over | @edstringer.bsky.social engelsbergideas.com/essays/the-a...

The age of the genius general is over

British commanders are still trained to prize the flash of intuitive brilliance. In an age of AI and autonomous systems, that instinct may prove actively regressive.

engelsbergideas.com

Rajiv Joseph's 'Archduke' at London's Royal Court reminds us that the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, and the continent's cascade into war, were not inevitable. Europe’s century of catastrophe need not have happened | Brendan Simms engelsbergideas.com/reviews/euro...

Europe's century of catastrophe need not have happened

Rajiv Joseph's 'Archduke' at London's Royal Court reminds us that the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, and the continent's cascade into war, were not inevitable.

engelsbergideas.com

Nolan's Odyssey was always going to be a spectacle, but it has little that is Homeric, and nothing at all Hellenic in spirit. Nolan’s Odyssey, not Homer’s | @armanddangour.bsky.social engelsbergideas.com/reviews/nola...

Nolan's Odyssey, not Homer's

Nolan's Odyssey was always going to be a spectacle, but it has little that is Homeric, and nothing at all Hellenic in spirit.

engelsbergideas.com

The chancellor who rebuilt West Germany after the Second World War showed, like Benjamin Disraeli before him, how a conservative party at ease with modernity can be a stabilising force for democracy. Adenauer, the German Disraeli | Lukas Schmelter engelsbergideas.com/notebook/ade...

Adenauer, the German Disraeli

The chancellor who rebuilt West Germany after the Second World War showed, like Benjamin Disraeli before him, how a conservative party at ease with modernity can be a stabilising force for democracy.

engelsbergideas.com

Argentina's World Cup campaign was a study in self-sabotage, one with a long literary pedigree. Rioplatense football’s death drive | Andreas Campomar engelsbergideas.com/notebook/rio...

Rioplatense football's death drive

Argentina's World Cup campiagn was a study in self-sabotage, one with a long literary pedigree.

engelsbergideas.com

Two hundred and fifty years after the first volume of the Decline and Fall, Edward Gibbon's diagnosis of why Rome collapsed is a warning to our own age. How civilisations fall, according to Gibbon | Paul Cartledge engelsbergideas.com/essays/how-c...

How civilisations fall, according to Gibbon

Two hundred and fifty years after the first volume of the Decline and Fall, Edward Gibbon's diagnosis of why Rome collapsed is a warning to our own age.

engelsbergideas.com

A new V&A exhibition makes the case for Schiaparelli as an artist, but its muted staging doesn't quite capture her enchanting oddness. Elsa Schiaparelli’s baroque fantasy | @murielzagha.bsky.social engelsbergideas.com/reviews/elsa...

Elsa Schiaparelli's baroque fantasy

A new V&A exhibition makes the case for Schiaparelli as an artist, but its muted staging doesn't quite capture her enchanting oddness.

engelsbergideas.com