Table of contents for 1553 in The Week

Controversy of the week Mass arrests in London A poet. A knight of the realm. Descendants of Holocaust survivors, and former government advisers. One by one, said the Daily Mirror’s Fleet Street Fox, they and over 500 others were arrested in Parliament Square on Saturday, in one of the largest mass arrests in modern British history. Their crime? Holding up handwritten placards reading: “I oppose genocide. I support Palestine Action.” The Government had proscribed the group as a terrorist organisation in July, after its members allegedly caused more than £7m of damage at RAF Brize Norton, in protest at what they called a “genocide” in Gaza. In so doing, said Fraser Myers on Spiked, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper didn’t just target Palestine Action, but also criminalised public expression of support…

The Cotswolds, parts of which were brought to a near standstill by the arrival of J.D. Vance for his summer holiday – along with his family and a huge security detail. The VP had rented a manor house in the hamlet of Dean, which was closed off to the public for the duration. Having earlier visited Foreign Secretary David Lammy at Chevening, Vance invited Reform UK’s Nigel Farage to breakfast, and also met shadow justice secretary Robert Jenrick. Arthur’s Seat, after firefighters had to battle overnight to contain a large fire that had broken out on the extinct volcano in Edinburgh. Fire chiefs said the blaze was almost certainly caused by human activity, as is the case with most of Scotland’s wildfires.…

Paris Honour for the “last hawker”: A 72-year-old man who has sold newspapers on the streets of Paris for the past 52 years is to be made a knight of the National Order of Merit – France’s second-highest honour – by Emmanuel Macron. Ali Akbar, originally from Pakistan, is the sole remaining newspaper “hawker” in Paris: every afternoon he sells copies of Le Monde in Saint-Germain-des-Prés, where he is a minor celebrity among the café-going classes. And when a student at Sciences Po, the French president was a regular customer, and would sometimes buy him a drink. “He knows a lot about wine,” is all Akbar was prepared to say. Jumilla, Spain Ban on religious festivals: A town in the southern Spanish region of Murcia has effectively banned the holding…

1 Girl on Fire by Alicia Keys, Salaam Remi, Jeff Bhasker and Billy Squier, performed by Alicia Keys 2 She’s Leaving Home by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, performed by The Beatles 3 Romeo and Juliet Suite No. 2, Op.64b: I. Montagues and Capulets – Dance of the Knights by Prokofiev, performed by the London Symphony Orchestra (conductor: Claudio Abbado) 4 Sonnet by Richard Ashcroft, performed by The Verve 5 Wild Horses by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, performed by The Rolling Stones 6 Golden Brown by Hugh Cornwell, Jean-Jacques Burnel, Dave Greenfield and Jet Black, performed by The Stranglers 7* Stairway to Heaven by Jimmy Page and Robert Plant, performed by Led Zeppelin 8 The Scientist by Chris Martin, Jonny Buckland, Guy Berryman and Will Champion, performed by Coldplay Book: The Herbal Apothecary by J.J. Pursell Luxury: a…

An American company that specialises in products for parents and babies has unveiled its latest offering: breast milk-inspired ice cream. Frida said that the treat doesn’t contain actual breast milk, but is an imitation of it – “just like Mom used to make”. Its website describes the ice cream as “lightly sweet, a little salty, with hints of honey and a dash of colostrum”. “It’s actually delicious,” said one social media user. “Don’t knock it till you try it.” An Irish TikToker has been sued by the makers of Sylvanian Families for posting videos in which the tiny animal dolls feature as the protagonists in dark and compromising stories. Some 2.5 million people follow the @sylvaniandrama account, in which a mother deer is seen relapsing with ketamine, a cat drinks…

Donald Trump and Emma Thompson would make for an unlikely couple, but when the left-wing actress was filming the 1998 movie Primary Colors (pictured) – playing a character based on Hillary Clinton – she was shocked to get a call from someone claiming to be Trump, asking her out. “He said, ‘I’d love you to come and stay at one of my beautiful places.’ I said, ‘Well, that’s very sweet… I’ll get back to you.’” It was only later that Thompson realised he’d called on the day her divorce from Kenneth Branagh came through. “I bet he’s got people looking for suitable people he could take out on his arm,” she said. “You know, a nice divorcée.” Great Yarmouth MP Rupert Lowe declared that he’ll make no apology for being…

“I wish there was a way to know you’re in the good old days before you’ve actually left them.”The Andy Bernard character in The Office, quoted in The Times “A desk is a dangerous place from which to view the world.”John le Carré, quoted on The Knowledge “Somewhere rummaging around in the backs of our brains is this fallacy that the longer I talk, the more convincing I’m going to be.”Bill McGowan, quoted in The Wall Street Journal “Wealth – any income that is at least one hundred dollars more a year than the income of one’s wife’s sister’s husband.”H.L. Mencken, quoted on B&T “When you slip on a banana peel, people laugh at you, but when you tell people you slipped on a banana peel, it’s your laugh.”Nora Ephron,…

To The Times Palestine Action has been banned because of its violent criminal activities, and for no other reason. No one is trying to stop people protesting about Gaza and the Palestinians, as long as those protests are peaceful. I’m not sure what the issue is. Andy Brown, Derby To The Times The Home Secretary proposed to ban Palestine Action on the grounds of “unacceptable criminal damage” after they infiltrated RAF Brize Norton. In the 1980s, when I was UK commander of RAF Greenham Common, I had a £250,000 annual budget to repair damage done by peace protesters to the perimeter fence. We had a strong Ministry of Defence police presence to stop intruders, often in a rather Benny Hill fashion. The intruders were left in no doubt that if…

Reneé Rapp: Bite Me Interscope Records £11.99 Today’s breakout male stars tend to be “deathly dull boy-next-door types singing earnestly about their feelings”, said Will Hodgkinson in The Times. By contrast, the new queens of pop – Charli XCX, Sabrina Carpenter, Chappell Roan and the like – are boldly colourful characters who are unashamedly having a blast. Now joining that list is 25-year-old US star Reneé Rapp. On her “fun, punky” second album, this “Joan Jett of modern pop” delivers a flamboyant and thrillingly confident celebration of sex, drugs and rock’n’roll. Rapp’s 2023 debut Snow Angel was excellent, and this “uproarious” follow-up is even better, said Rob Sheffield in Rolling Stone. It’s her first album since coming out as gay, and “damn, she’s making up for lost time, with bangers…

Sunset Song by Lewis Grassic Gibbon, 1932 (Canongate £7.99). This is the novel that ignited my love of literature. Set in the northeast of Scotland during the First World War, it tells the story of a girl torn between her yearning for education and travel and her loyalty to the rural community she was born into. Rooted in a unique place at a pivotal moment in history, it is also a timeless and universal story about coming of age and the pressures and expectations of womanhood. Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, 2006 (Fourth Estate £9.99). Set during the Biafran War, this is both a beautiful love story and an affecting account of the human impact of civil war. It educates, entertains and moves the reader –…

Programmes 24 Hours: The Japanese Surrender An exploration of how Japan came to surrender in the aftermath of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, despite intense pressure to keep fighting. Sat 16 Aug, C4 20:10 (60mins). Aurora Orchestra Plays Shostakovich’s Fifth Nicholas Collon conducts the Aurora Orchestra in a from-memory performance – with actors – of the composer’s masterpiece, on the 50th anniversary of his death. Sun 17 Aug, BBC4 20:00 (105mins). Confessions of a Brain Surgeon Henry Marsh takes a candid look back at his life and career, while travelling the world to meet a new generation of surgeons. Mon 18 Aug, BBC2 21:00 (60mins). One Night Six-part Australian drama about a debut author (Jodie Whittaker) whose story about a traumatic event from her past may not be entirely her own. Mon…

● Check apps for river currents and tide times. You can check for current by treading water in your depth and looking at a still object on land. If there’s a strong current, swim against the flow and let it bring you back. Some reservoirs and quarry lakes can have strong underwater currents. ● Try not to swim alone, and if you do, tell someone nearby you’re going in. Take a tow float and wear a hi-vis cap. Avoid harbours and areas with watersports. ● Always work out how you will get out of the water before you get in. ● Alcohol is one of the main causes of swimming fatalities; don’t be tempted to drink and swim. ● Don’t be fooled by a flat surface – it may hide…

Tom Lehrer 1928-2025 Tom Lehrer was a bespectacled Harvard-trained mathematician whose “wickedly iconoclastic” songs won him a huge following in the 1950s, said The New York Times. Performed at the piano to “maddeningly” jaunty tunes, they were witty and nimble, often “salacious”, and almost always sardonic. The more famous included the macabre ballad I Hold Your Hand in Mine, The Masochism Tango (“I ache for the touch of your lips, dear/But much more for the touch of your whips, dear”) and Be Prepared, a “boy scout marching song”, in which he urged his listeners: “Don’t solicit for your sister, that’s not nice/Unless you get a good percentage of her price.” He sold thousands of records. But his career as an entertainer had always been just a series of sabbaticals away…

The Chancellor has her work cut out weaning some 7.8 million British savers off their cash Isas and into stocks and shares, said Jack Simpson in The Sunday Times. But with savings rates falling, it’s a good time to switch: The right platform The independent comparison site Investing Insiders ranked 45 investment Isa platforms. Its top overall pick is InvestEngine – “the lowest-cost Isa on the market” with a “nice app” and strong past performance. AJ Bell comes second: commended for its wide range of available markets. XTB, in third place, is rated for its low price, “excellent investment options” and for paying 4.5% interest on uninvested cash. Cost is key “Fees can make a big difference over the long run,” said Ed Monk of Fidelity – particularly if you’re…

The week’s best shares Cordiant Digital Infrastructure The Daily Telegraph This specialist investor focuses on data centres, telecoms and fibre-optic networks in Europe. Benefits from highly visible, often index-linked, revenues. Yields 4.5%. Buy. 96.8p. Golden Prospect Precious Metals The Mail on Sunday This trust invests in about 50 precious metal miners: from global multibillion-dollar giants to junior explorers. Trades at a “material” discount and is offering one new share at 48p for every five held. Buy. 58p. GSK The Daily Telegraph The biopharma continues to increase investment in its pipeline. Shares have disappointed, but the cheap stock compensates for high geopolitical risk, and the dividend is rising. Yields 4.4%. Buy. £13.83. Primary Health Properties The Times This Reit has 516 community health centres that aim to take pressure off NHS…

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Police in Wrexham have denied telling a local shopkeeper that he could not refer to shoplifters as “scum bags”. Rob Davies says that after a series of thefts at his vintage shop, he put up a sign advising: that “due to scum bags shoplifting, please ask for assistance to open cabinets”. He claims a police officer, acting on a complaint, told him it was offensive, but admitted no one actually told him to take it down. Anxious parents can now invest in trainers that enable them to track their children. Aimed at four- to eight-year-olds, the shoes have a hidden compartment in their soles designed to fit an AirTag device. Skechers say Find My Skechers is to help users find lost trainers, but the advert also says it brings parents…

Drivers over 70 could be made to sit eye tests every three years, and face being banned if they fail them, as part of a radical overhaul of the UK’s road safety laws due in the autumn. Ministers are also considering mandatory medical tests for over-70s for conditions such as dementia; reducing the drink-drive limit; and giving drivers penalty points if their passengers don’t wear seatbelts. However, the Government has backed away from the idea of banning newly qualified drivers from carrying passengers. Since 2010, there had been a 20% rise in the number of serious accidents on Britain’s roads, and a 47% rise in the number of drivers over 60 being involved in serious collisions.…

Washington DC Trump seizes control: Donald Trump ordered the National Guard to Washington DC on Monday, and for the first time ever invoked a local law to federalise its police department. Announcing the temporary takeover, the president said that the capital was “one of the most dangerous cities anywhere in the world”, and that it needed to be rescued from “bloodthirsty” gangs, “bedlam and squalor and worse”. Earlier, he had called for the street homeless to be driven out. Local officials acknowledge that violent crime spiked in 2023, but say that it has since dropped to a 30-year low. There were 187 homicides last year, down from 482 in 1991. They also say rates of homelessness are falling. Some 800 National Guard troops will be sent to the ethnically diverse,…

“It has taken me a while to absorb the advice of my late literary agent, the blunt and wonderfully New York Jewish Ed Victor. How I miss him! On taking me on as his client, he said this: ‘Matthew, God has given you a minor talent. It is my job to monetise it for you.’ I had always thought there were two career alternatives: being a soar-away genius or failing. Ed opened my eyes to the world of possibility that lies between.” Matthew Parris in The Times “Whatever meat it is, you just have to let it rest for much longer than you think. In the case of a roast, about half as long as it took to cook. With a grilled thing, two or three times as long as…

Why Trump’s policies will outlast him Megan McArdle The Washington Post The most powerful force in US politics, says Megan McArdle, isn’t money or ambition or strategy. It’s “inertia”. Voters may demand change, but the system is geared to preserving the status quo. Get elected to Congress, and “incumbency bias” will probably grant you a seat for life. “Get a programme passed, against all odds, and it’s likely to outlive you.” We saw it with Barack Obama’s big healthcare reforms, which Republicans vowed to repeal at the first opportunity. They haven’t, because that “would have meant removing parts of the law that voters liked”. We’ll likely see the same with Trump’s innovations. Trade tariffs are a “regressive tax on consumers”, but that doesn’t mean a future administration will rush to…

The number of fake or low-quality scientific papers being published is growing at such a pace, science risks being “poisoned” by them, the authors of a new analysis have warned. The problem is already so widespread that more than 10,000 papers were retracted in 2023 alone; many more will have gone undetected. Editors and watchdogs first started to worry about papers with fabricated data and doctored images in the 2010s; since then, the factors driving this have only intensified. Researchers are under pressure to get their names onto papers, to qualify for jobs, promotions and grants. And in response, publishers have launched thousands more journals for papers to be published in. But many are being churned out by “paper mills”, which plagiarise existing research to produce bogus papers – and…

She has been accused of “staggering hypocrisy” – and it’s easy to see why, said Madeline Grant in The Spectator. Having pledged to take on unscrupulous landlords, Homelessness Minister Rushanara Ali became the fourth minister to resign from the Labour Government last week, after it emerged she had evicted four tenants from an east London property she owns, and then re-let it soon after for £700 more a month. That’s right: “the Homelessness Minister has been sacked for making people homeless”. Ali insists that she operated within “the letter of the existing law”, said Alison Phillips in The i Paper. And she did, but that is completely missing the point. Her actions were legal only because Labour’s flagship Renters’ Rights Bill – which Ali had spent months promoting – hasn’t…

When Crystal Palace upset Manchester City to win the FA Cup in May, it was the club’s “first trophy in their 120-year history”, said Jason Burt in The Daily Telegraph. And at Wembley on Sunday, Oliver Glasner’s side ensured that the wait for “a second piece of silverware” would be considerably shorter: they beat Liverpool on penalties to lift the Community Shield. The Reds have spent nearly £300m on new players this summer, said Ed Aarons in The Guardian. And it didn’t take long for their “new boys to make an impression”: Hugo Ekitiké, their £79m French striker, opened the scoring at four minutes, after exchanging a one-two with £116m German midfielder Florian Wirtz. Palace levelled with a penalty, but Jeremie Frimpong – Liverpool’s replacement for Trent Alexander-Arnold – somewhat…

Golf Justin Rose, 45, became the oldest European to win a title on the modern-era PGA Tour, with victory in the FedEx St. Jude Championship in Memphis. The Englishman hit six birdies in his final eight holes before beating J.J. Spaun in a playoff. Football Jack Grealish is to join Everton on a season’s loan from Manchester City, after agreeing to join the Merseyside club in an effort to revive his flagging career. Tug-of-War Britain are world tug-of-war champions, after beating reigning champions Switzerland at the World Games in Chengdu.…

Why did pub food get so grim? Is it just me, or is pub food in Britain on the slide again, asks Steve Rose in The Guardian. The 1990s and 2000s were supposed to have “ushered in a wave of quality gastropubs” run by talented chefs serving good food cooked from scratch. But while there are still many fine places to eat, the overall picture, especially in rural areas, is a bit “grim”. Pubs – like restaurants – have been hit by a plethora of sharply rising costs. And many have responded by dispensing with proper chefs, and filling their “gastropub-looking” menus with dishes bought in from external catering companies, or even from the supermarket ready-meal aisles. In chain pubs, dishes such as lasagne and fish and chips will invariably…

You’re never far from a beach or pontoon in Stockholm. One of the loveliest swimming beaches, Brunnsviksbadet, is on a tree-fringed lake (free; parker.stockholm). Berlin is surrounded by swimming lakes, and water quality is monitored every two weeks (berlin.de/lageso). Schlachtensee, by a forest, has clear water (free; visitberlin.de). Copenhagen has several harbour pools with water monitored daily (badevand.dk). Islands Brygge has a swimming pool and a diving pool (free; svoemkbh.kk.dk). There are saunas (from £23; koknorge.no) beside all the city-centre quays in Oslo. The city also has three urban beaches, including Operastranda, which has a diving platform. Check oslo.kommune.no for water quality. Vienna has the world’s largest floating trampoline park (from £4; danubejumping. at) on the New Danube, a canal that is much cleaner than the actual river and has…

The Farm Eleuthera, Bahamas Set on an organic farm on the quiet Bahamian island of Eleuthera, this new hotel – the third from the family-owned Little Island Hotels group – makes a peaceful retreat from the fashionable scene on nearby Harbour Island, says Ruaridh Nicoll in Condé Nast Traveller. The 12 “lovely” cottages are arranged around raised garden beds. There’s a pool, a gym, a bar with backgammon and chess boards, and a pescetarian restaurant. The beach is a five-minute walk away at hotel number two (The Other Side), and from there it’s ten minutes by boat to Harbour Island and hotel number one, the iconic Ocean View. Doubles from $400; littleislandhotels.com.…

HSBC/China South City: the pain in Hong Kong Since Georges Elhedery took the helm of HSBC last September, “investors have mostly cheered his efforts to streamline Europe’s biggest bank by assets”, said The Wall Street Journal: shares have risen by 45%. But an old bogey has returned to haunt the bank, which was founded in Hong Kong and makes most of its profits in Asia. The latest quarterly figures show that “trouble in Hong Kong’s office market continues to hurt the lender”. Hong Kong’s prime office rents have fallen by more than 20% since 2022 and vacancies are at record highs, noted Arjun Neil Alim and Chan Ho-Him in the FT. As a result, “almost three-quarters” of HSBC’s “Hong Kong commercial property loan book was flashing warning signs by the…

Disarray among the rate-setters Alex Brummer Daily Mail Last week’s session of the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee was “one for the connoisseurs”, says Alex Brummer: it was the first time since the Bank got its independence in 1997 that the MPC had required “two votes to reach a decision”, suggesting that the age of “group think” in Threadneedle Street may be over. It was always going to be tough to reach an agreement to cut interest rates (by a quarter-point to 4%) while consumer prices were still rising. Having long signalled such a reduction, governor Andrew Bailey had little option but to press ahead, but it has left him “out of step” with his two most senior economic gurus: chief economist Huw Pill and deputy governor for monetary…

War of the Worlds, the latest film adaptation of H.G. Wells’s 1898 novel, which rose to the top of Amazon Prime’s streaming chart, despite being panned as the worst film of the year. Starring Ice Cube, it scores 3% on Rotten Tomatoes. Critics said it relentlessly promotes Amazon, and is not even “stupid fun”. Marks & Spencer, which finally resumed its click and collect service, nearly four months after its operations were paralysed by cyberattackers. Four people aged 17 to 20 were arrested last month in connection with the attack. Zealous policing, after a criminal investigation was opened into the case of a woman in southern Germany who stands accused of stealing 15 cents-worth of rainwater from a butt in her neighbour’s garden. She had apparently snuck out in the…

One in ten teachers say they are “very likely” to quit the profession in the next two years. More than a third say their workload is overwhelming, and only 22% say it is manageable. Kahoot!/The Independent 61% of British 18- to 30-year-olds are concerned about violent crime in their area. Only 18% are not concerned. Adam Smith Institute/The Daily Telegraph Only 5% of Britons view the Duke of York favourably, while 87% have an unfavourable view of him – making him the least popular member of the royal family. 20% have a favourable view of Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, and 28% think favourably of Prince Harry. Prince William tops the chart, on 74%. YouGov…

Quitting the E Street Band David Sancious was only 17 when Bruce Springsteen asked him to join his backing band. It was 1971, and Springsteen, then 21, had approached him at a club in New Jersey. The pair hit it off; and before long, they were rehearsing in a surfboard factory owned by an early manager of Springsteen’s. The band made one album, then another, and went on tour. “We didn’t have private planes back then,” he told Sarfraz Manzoor in The Guardian. “We had a station wagon, three of the guys in the front and three in the back. You’re doing everything with these people. Eating, laughing, crying with them if something really bad happens. It’s a great life.” In 1974, Springsteen even named his band after the road…

Slash spending – there is no alternative Robert Colvile The Sunday Times When will our politicians face up to reality, asks Robert Colvile. When will they accept that the endless cycle of fiscal crunches afflicting them are not just down to high borrowing costs or Donald Trump’s tariffs, but stem from an “irreconcilable clash between how much we want to spend and how much we can actually afford”? The problem boils down to this: the state’s three top expenses – the NHS, welfare, pensions – are growing faster than the economy, largely as a result of our ageing population. Returning to the ratio of workers to pensioners we had as recently as 2004 would hand the Treasury another £80bn, but we’re going in the other direction. And in the face…

Why UPFs are fattening It is well established that people who eat a lot of ultra-processed foods (UPFs) are more likely to be overweight or obese. What has been less clear is whether this is due to such foods tending to be high in fat and sugar, or to some other factor. In an effort to find out, scientists at University College London asked 55 adults to eat a balanced diet that was mainly made up of either UPFs or minimally processed foods (MPFs), for eight weeks. They then had a break for four weeks, before switching to the other one. Both diets contained the recommended levels of fat, protein, carbs, fibre and sugar; and the meals were similar in type: homemade lasagne vs. a pastabased ready meal, for instance.…

“Assassination,” wrote George Bernard Shaw, “is the extreme form of censorship.” This truth was brought home to the world this week, said Binoy Kampmark on Middle East Monitor, when a prominent Palestinian journalist, Anas al-Sharif, was killed along with three of his Al Jazeera colleagues by an air strike on a press tent in Gaza City. An Israel Defence Forces (IDF) spokesman confirmed that Sharif had been deliberately targeted, claiming that intelligence obtained before the strike proved he was “an active Hamas military wing operative”. Sceptics dismissed that claim, asking how Sharif could have led a rocket-launching squad while reporting in front of a camera all day. A different IDF spokesman had levelled the same accusation at Sharif last month, prompting calls from the Committee to Protect Journalists for the…

When Emma Raducanu played Aryna Sabalenka at Wimbledon last month, she lost the match in two tight sets. On Monday, she faced the world No. 1 again, in the third round of the Cincinnati Open, and this time pushed her even closer, going down 7-6, 4-6, 7-6 in an “epic three-hour-and-nine-minute scuffle”, said Tumaini Carayol in The Guardian. Across the North American hard-court season, Raducanu has maintained her momentum from Wimbledon, “playing and winning consistently”. It didn’t end in victory, but Monday’s performance was, overall, “one of the most impressive” of her career. Raducanu is undoubtedly on an upward trajectory, said Elgan Alderman in The Times. This match, played out in stifling heat, was a “world away from the straight-sets wiltings” that have marked so many of her outings against…

Human intelligence To the Financial Times Of all the life-defining moments I can remember – graduation, heartbreak, first job – my brain insists on clinging to a 2016 economics exam, held in a sweltering basement classroom. The task: “Explain Schumpeter’s theory of innovation.” I dutifully wrote about “creative destruction”, throwing in all the right textbook clichés. Back then, it felt like just an economic theory. Now, it feels almost brutal. Your piece on artificial intelligence and cognitive offloading brought that concept home, and with a thud. At Wimbledon this year, something was off: the line judges were gone, replaced by AI that now calls the shots, literally. No one blinked. The humans had vanished without ceremony. Back home in India, the same shift is happening in offices. Tech groups are…

If you’re a fan of the 1977 movie Grease (and who isn’t?) and a lover of adventurous theatre, “you’ll be hopelessly devoted” to the latest extravaganza from Secret Cinema, said Nick Curtis in The London Standard. For its adaptation, the immersive cinema/theatre company has transformed a huge shed in Battersea Park into Grease’s Rydell High School. Inside, a central stage is ringed by ten vast video screens, and platforms where set pieces are recreated by the cast and crew: an auto shop for Greased Lightnin’, a salon for Beauty School Dropout, and so on. Outside, there’s a recreation of the funfair where Danny and Sandy finally get together, complete with food and drinks stalls. “The atmosphere is part festival, part hen-do”, and the whole thing is a “masterpiece of coordination”…

Les Demoiselles d’Avignon is regarded as a seminal piece in the history of modern art, marking a pivotal moment in Picasso’s turn towards cubism, says The Times. But what inspired this image which, when he unveiled it in 1907, so shocked his peers? Its use of pictorial space, including fragmented planes and multiple perspectives, seemed like nothing in Western art. However, art historians later saw in the angular and abstracted faces of two of the figures clear resemblances to African tribal masks. Picasso had a well documented interest in non-Western art, and thus this theory took hold. Alain Moreau, a self-styled “art detective”, now suggests otherwise. In a new paper, he argues that Picasso finished the painting before he started to engage with African art, and that it was more…

In his ongoing feud with Justin, Brian refuses to harvest the BL wheat. A desperate Stella persuades the two to meet and iron things out, but an angry Brian storms out, saying Justin’s wheat can rot. On learning that Brian has gone away for a week, Stella enlists Ruth’s help to get the harvest without his knowledge. Kirsty is looking for a lodger – and is surprised when Kate suggests she move in. Dane encourages Lily to apply for the wedding coordinator post, but she’s not interested – she has plans to travel. Later, Lily tries to share winning tug-of-war tactics with Dane and Leroy, but they brush her off. Will and Emma meet Amber for brunch and agree to help pay for a wedding venue. With stock all over…

Feeds 4-6, as a side 360g mixed tomatoes 480g melon 300g cucumber handful of flat-leaf parsley leaves For the dressing: 60g sesame seeds, freshly toasted 1 green chilli 1 garlic clove, skin on ½ tsp cumin seeds ½ tsp Mexican oregano zest and juice of 1 lime, plus extra to taste ½ tbsp maple syrup, plus extra to taste 120ml extra virgin olive oil • Cut the tomatoes into large chunks and put into a large mixing bowl. You are looking for fun, rough, diamond-shaped cuts, so think slants and bias-slices. Peel and deseed the melon, then cut into similar-sized pieces to the tomatoes and add to the bowl. Peel, halve and deseed the cucumber, cut it in the same way, adding it to the bowl. Season the lot with ½…

Stella Rimington 1935-2025 The first head of the Security Service to be publicly identified, Stella Rimington, who has died aged 90, was also the first woman to lead the agency better known as MI5. It was, she recalled, a “tweedy” male world that she had joined as a typist in the 1960s, but she had relished the idea of Cold War-era spy work: “You know, going around listening to people’s telephones and opening their mail and stuff.” And as she rose to the top of various departments – notably counter-subversion, which she led during the 1984 miners’ strike – she established herself as a “formidable Whitehall streetfighter”, said The Guardian. As director general of MI5 from 1992, one of her more striking achievements was in wresting away the lead role…

Sushovan Hussain The former finance chief of Autonomy – the software company owned by the late Mike Lynch – is planning a fresh venture, says James Titcomb in The Daily Telegraph. Hussain’s new company, Liberatus, will help former criminals return to the workforce. He knows the difficulties well. Convicted of fraud over Autonomy’s £7bn sale to Hewlett-Packard, he spent more than three years in a US prison before being released in 2024 – months before Lynch’s acquittal and subsequent death. Like many ex-offenders, he faced problems opening bank accounts, obtaining ID and so on. Liberatus is opening in Cambridge before a hoped-for expansion nationwide, ideally with support from Prisons Minister Lord Timpson. Meredith Whittaker The American boss of Signal, “the go-to messaging app for privacy-conscious smartphone owners”, is so concerned…

THE WEEK CROSSWORD 1478 Two Connell Guides and three Week-branded items will be given to the sender of the first correct solution to the crossword and the clue of the week opened on Monday 25 August. Send it to The Week Crossword 1478, 121-141 Westbourne Terrace, London W2 6JR, or email the completed grid/listed solutions to crossword@theweek.co.uk. By Paul McKenna This week’s winner will receive Week-branded items, as well as two Connell Guides (connellguides.com). ACROSS 1 Second-guess shriek of warning near pitch (8)  5 From Latin understand being away ultimately gets jeers (6) 9 Think about one who proposes to hang on to profit (4,4) 10 Excitedly lead in a lion-tamer? (6) 12 European in unusually apt sight providing sustenance (9) 13 Force male rowing crew to drop leader (5) 14…