https://www.scmp.com/rss/1847/feed Gary Jones is a freelance writer and editor. Based in Asia since 1991, his work has appeared in publications worldwide, including Time magazine, The Times and The Sunday Times, the Observer, USA Today, Wallpaper, British GQ, Sydney Morning Herald, Globe & Mail and LA Weekly, among others. en https://assets.i-scmp.com/static/img/icons/scmp-meta-1200x630.png https://www.scmp.com Tonlé Sap, in northern Cambodia, is the largest freshwater lake in Southeast Asia. During the May to October rainy season, it swells to six times its dry-season size, extending over 16,000 sq km – an area 200 times that of Hong Kong Island. Tonlé Sap has also long been one of the planet’s most produc­tive inland fisheries. More than a million people depend on the lake for their livelihood, and about 100,000 live in its vicinity. While many dwell in stilted villages on the lake’s flood­plain, the... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/3087394/how-cambodias-floating-hospitals-are-saving?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/3087394/how-cambodias-floating-hospitals-are-saving?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 06 Jun 2020 06:15:16 +0000 The most startling thing Sarah James remembers about Max’s 2007 poisoning was that he cried black tears. Dying, coat slathered in his own vomit, the dog shook as a vet hurriedly administered activated charcoal, hoping the decontaminant would bind with the deadly poison in Max’s gut to stop it entering the bloodstream. Some had splashed into the suffering animal’s pleading eyes. A teenage Island School student living in Hong Kong’s Mid-Levels at the time, James had become aware of her dog’s... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/3038762/how-has-hong-kongs-notorious-serial-pet-killer?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/3038762/how-has-hong-kongs-notorious-serial-pet-killer?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 24 Nov 2019 02:00:10 +0000 With just an hour to go before the China launch of New Chinese Architecture: Twenty Women Building the Future, the book’s British managing editor, Austin Williams, is explaining why he wanted no mention of females on its cover. Although the full-colour volume is hailed in marketing blurb as “the first of its kind detailing the lives, achievements and ambitions of 20 successful, influential women architects living and working in China today”, he would have preferred no gender-revealing spoiler in... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/3015465/architects-shaping-chinas-future-have-one-thing?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/3015465/architects-shaping-chinas-future-have-one-thing?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 23 Jun 2019 07:00:16 +0000 The Magic of Handwriting by Christine Nelson, published by Taschen. 4/5 stars In 1888, Paul Gauguin left Paris to join fellow artist Vincent van Gogh in Arles, a city in the Provence region of southern France. The next year, Gauguin dramatically claimed in a letter that he had feared for his life during his time there. “Unfortunately this friend went raving mad,” Gauguin wrote of Van Gogh, “and for a whole month I lived under the constant fear of a mortal or tragic accident.” Following his... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/3009740/van-gogh-walt-disney-magic-handwriting-showcases-intimate?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/3009740/van-gogh-walt-disney-magic-handwriting-showcases-intimate?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 12 May 2019 14:00:12 +0000 The second chapter of a two-part story recounts the daily struggles of the refugees during their nearly five months of confinement aboard the freighter Tap here to launch this special feature https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/3007779/stranded-skyluck-daily-struggles-and-one-final?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/3007779/stranded-skyluck-daily-struggles-and-one-final?utm_source=rss_feed Tue, 30 Apr 2019 00:15:10 +0000 Click here to launch this special feature https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/3006757/skyluck-fraught-journey-freighter-carrying-2600?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/3006757/skyluck-fraught-journey-freighter-carrying-2600?utm_source=rss_feed Tue, 23 Apr 2019 00:15:00 +0000 “Money, name, fame and a string of hits – I had it all. I had friends whom I could party with at any time and awards that were coveted by many. It was a life only the chosen few get to live. But even though the world was at my feet, something strange began happening to me. I soon started feeling the misery of existence. I became wretched.” Although those words are hers, Bollywood actor Manisha Koirala does not appear wretched today, but polished, professional and self-assured. On a high floor of... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/2188973/bollywood-star-manisha-koirala-having-it-all?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/2188973/bollywood-star-manisha-koirala-having-it-all?utm_source=rss_feed Thu, 07 Mar 2019 12:04:15 +0000 From China’s Three Kingdoms to the Seven Hills of Rome, prefix any group of kindred landmarks with a number and something magical happens, conjuring up visions of ancient realms cloaked in wonder. While the villages of the Cinque Terre – or the “Five Lands” – are likely less sensational than the Fourteen Flames of Valyria (volcanoes, apparently, in Game of Thrones), they are such clichés of what Italian fishing communities should look like as to appear otherworldly. Dotted along the Italian... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/travel/article/2185918/cinque-terre-italys-five-fabulous-villages-seafood?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/travel/article/2185918/cinque-terre-italys-five-fabulous-villages-seafood?utm_source=rss_feed Wed, 13 Feb 2019 06:33:38 +0000 Newseum? Is that nimble wordplay or a typo? It’s a corny name, admittedly. The Newseum is an engaging, immersive museum that celebrates freedom of expression, the free press and the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, and traces the evolution of journalism and the news media. It boasts 15 galleries and 15 theatres over seven floors, covering everything from 9/11 and the fall of the Berlin Wall to the industry-disruptive nature of the internet and the phenomenon of fake news. Where... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/travel/article/2180726/what-do-washington-during-government-shutdown-pay?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/travel/article/2180726/what-do-washington-during-government-shutdown-pay?utm_source=rss_feed Fri, 04 Jan 2019 14:01:37 +0000 The Boys in the Cave: Deep Inside the Impossible Rescue in Thailand, by Matt Gutman, pub. HarperCollins 4/5 stars Millions of people worldwide were transfixed by the real-world Mission: Impossible playing out in the north of Thailand for two fraught weeks in June and July this year. Just outside the town of Mae Sai, in the northern Chiang Rai province, 12 boys from the Wild Boars junior soccer team had been taken by their assistant coach to explore the nearby Tham Luang Nang Non cave. When the... https://www.scmp.com/culture/books/article/2176740/first-book-thai-cave-rescues-boys-cave-gripping-account-mission?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/culture/books/article/2176740/first-book-thai-cave-rescues-boys-cave-gripping-account-mission?utm_source=rss_feed Fri, 07 Dec 2018 22:00:49 +0000 A Death in Peking Graeme Sheppard Earnshaw Books At the last count, book titles attempting to unravel the mystery behind a spate of unsolved murders committed in London’s East End in 1888 numbered in the billions. That’s not true, of course (search for Jack the Ripper books on Amazon.com and the counting algorithm gives up at “over 1,000 results”). But when it comes to what police call “cold cases”, especially those perpetrated long ago, facts are notoriously tough to pin down. Sin city: the... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/books/article/2173079/death-peking-ex-police-officer-sheds-new-light-grisly?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/books/article/2173079/death-peking-ex-police-officer-sheds-new-light-grisly?utm_source=rss_feed Wed, 14 Nov 2018 14:00:45 +0000 The stereotypical image of the Vietnam war veteran, returning to the United States after an arduous tour of duty, only to be spat upon and cursed as a murderer by sneering, long-haired peace protesters, is seared into the American psyche like a scar from a white-hot burst of napalm. The accepted belief is that weary veterans trudged home to be condemned, cold-shouldered, even physically assaulted – simply for doing their duty to their country. In popular culture, the phenomenon was memorably... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/2140414/why-american-soldiers-were-front-lines-anti?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/2140414/why-american-soldiers-were-front-lines-anti?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 07 Apr 2018 13:46:23 +0000 Chinese artist Zhan Wang’s Floating Rock very nearly never made it to this year’s “Sculpture by the Sea” festival, which is currently being held in the Western Australia city of Perth – and one of the largest free-to-the-public outdoor sculpture exhibitions held anywhere in the world. Ironically, Zhan had suffered problems getting his creation onto the water: due to an issue with a freight forwarder, his monster sculpture, which stands two metres tall and four metres wide, was not loaded onto... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/travel/article/2136333/chinese-sculptors-floating-art-finally-rocks?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/travel/article/2136333/chinese-sculptors-floating-art-finally-rocks?utm_source=rss_feed Thu, 08 Mar 2018 09:46:57 +0000 Dead Men’s Trousersby Irvine Welsh Jonathan Cape “The dog ate it” has never been a smart excuse for failing to deliver an assignment. In Dead Men’s Trousers – the new novel from Irvine Welsh, and which regroups the heroin-addled Scottish reprobates from his gritty, mega-selling debut Trainspotting (1993) – core character Spud’s failure to meet his deadline results in sex-tape blackmail, a grisly form of drug smuggling, YouTube-assisted DIY surgery and death for one of the gang. 2018’s must-read... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/books/article/2136109/trainspotting-author-back-doing-what-he-does-best?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/books/article/2136109/trainspotting-author-back-doing-what-he-does-best?utm_source=rss_feed Wed, 07 Mar 2018 12:02:19 +0000 The Dictionary of the Asian Language by Todd Crowell Blacksmith Books 3 stars From its launch in 1975 to its closure in 2001, Asiaweek was a respected English-language news magazine published out of Hong Kong but covering the entire continent. In the early 1990s, the magazine’s co-founder and editor-in-chief, New Zealander Michael O’Neill, introduced to its pages a regular column titled “The Dictionary of the Asian Language”. Todd Crowell, a senior writer at Asiaweek, thought O’Neill’s idea... https://www.scmp.com/culture/books/article/2122386/dictionary-asian-language-reviewed-trivia-tome-reboots-popular?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/culture/books/article/2122386/dictionary-asian-language-reviewed-trivia-tome-reboots-popular?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 03 Dec 2017 10:04:07 +0000 What is it? You’ll have heard of the Bangkok Hilton, which is not a chain hotel, of course, but pop-culture slang for the Thai capital’s Bang Kwang Central Prison. That notorious, high-security facility accommo­dates murderers, drug smugglers and long-serving prisoners, including foreigners. Shorter-stay visitors to Bangkok (those, at least, with a quirky taste for the nefarious) are increasingly escaping to Sook Station. The jail-themed budget property sprang from husband-and-wife owners... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/travel/article/2115931/inside-bangkoks-prison-themed-hotel-get-taste-life?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/travel/article/2115931/inside-bangkoks-prison-themed-hotel-get-taste-life?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 22 Oct 2017 05:15:33 +0000 Epic Drives of the World Lonely Planet 4 stars Cruising in the slipstream of Lonely Planet’s Epic Bike Rides of the World, released in September last year, comes Epic Drives of the World. This, though, is absolutely not the style of guidebook to chuck into the backpack, being chunky, close to 3cm thick, in hard back and heavy. This is more of the type of tome for the coffee table, or the dentist’s waiting room, or the passenger seat of a 1972 Mercedes-Benz 350SL Cabriolet parked on the... https://www.scmp.com/culture/books/article/2104132/book-review-lonely-planets-epic-drives-world-will-inspire-motorists?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/culture/books/article/2104132/book-review-lonely-planets-epic-drives-world-will-inspire-motorists?utm_source=rss_feed Wed, 26 Jul 2017 05:16:37 +0000 Volunteer: A Traveller’s Guide to Making a Difference Around the World Lonely Planet 3.5 stars Lonely Planet travel guides were essential packing when this reviewer left the UK to explore Asia in pre-internet 1990 (and then never really left). Unfortunately, the books often proved out of date. That shouldn’t be the case with the new edition of the publisher’s Volunteer: A Traveller’s Guide to Making a Difference Around the World, a book aimed at readers “looking for a more meaningful travel... https://www.scmp.com/culture/books/article/2102312/book-review-lonely-planets-new-guide-volunteering-people-who-see?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/culture/books/article/2102312/book-review-lonely-planets-new-guide-volunteering-people-who-see?utm_source=rss_feed Wed, 12 Jul 2017 05:00:00 +0000 Like the late, great Ansel Adams, whose black-and-white landscapes of Yosemite are defining images of that Californian national park, John McDermott’s photography is strongly tied to a place. The 61-year-old’s iconic depictions of Cambodia’s Angkor (within which is wonder-of-the-world Angkor Wat) are dreamlike and otherworldly, and yet also capture what one feels when visiting. With ghostly monks climbing sandstone steps towards the heavens, 20-metre-high gates looming from primeval jungle,... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/2061278/angkor-another-light-photographers-unique-take?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/2061278/angkor-another-light-photographers-unique-take?utm_source=rss_feed Thu, 12 Jan 2017 03:45:00 +0000 On December 10, New York’s punk-poet laureate, Patti Smith, accepted the Nobel Prize for Literature on behalf of Bob Dylan, perform­ing a sparse but moving arrangement of his A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall at Stockholm Concert Hall. Smith had planned to sing one of her own tunes – she had, after all, accepted the Nobel Foundation’s invitation to perform as early as September, before Dylan had been announced as winner. The veteran art-rocker accepted the invitation while attending the opening of an... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/travel/article/2058973/stockholms-vibrant-glorious-public-spaces-are-riot?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/travel/article/2058973/stockholms-vibrant-glorious-public-spaces-are-riot?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 07 Jan 2017 08:15:30 +0000 Nobel laureate Joseph Brodsky adored Venice. So much so that, starting in the early 1970s, he dropped in on the Italian lagoon city annually for 17 years, enigmatically describing his buoyant Eden as being “like Greta Garbo swimming”. Here the Russian poet would all but disappear, becoming “a small moving dot in that gigantic watercolour”. However, Brodsky added, “I would never come here in summer, not even at gunpoint.” The good, the bad and the ugly sides of Venice: how to get the best out of... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/travel/article/2054455/venice-winter-hazy-horde-free-gigantic-living?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/travel/article/2054455/venice-winter-hazy-horde-free-gigantic-living?utm_source=rss_feed Wed, 14 Dec 2016 07:00:00 +0000 The man is unconscious in the whooping ambulance as it races towards the hospital. A rectangle of surgical gauze now covers the gash in his cheek as we nag and bully our way through the Saturday evening traffic. Gobs of dark blood ooze from his right ear, suggesting cranial trauma, possibly a fractured skull. A boyish paramedic presses at the man’s abdomen, searching for signs of internal bleeding. A second youngster has clipped a pulse oximeter to the man’s finger, the cheap-looking plastic... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/2050828/roads-vientiane-teenage-first-responders-saving?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/2050828/roads-vientiane-teenage-first-responders-saving?utm_source=rss_feed Thu, 01 Dec 2016 22:00:30 +0000 Imagine all the casinos of Vegas sudden­ly bolted shut. How would Siem Reap fare if Angkor Wat were not just down the road, and what would become of Niagara Falls (the city) without Niagara Falls (the falls)? Imagine, then, Calcata’s dilemma when the parish priest, one day in 1983, announced that the foreskin of Jesus Christ, which he had kept in a shoebox at the back of his wardrobe, had “vanished”. The Santissimo Prepuzio, the “blessed foreskin”, had drawn pilgrims to the ancient Italian... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/travel/article/2027766/calcata-italian-town-lost-jesus-foreskin?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/travel/article/2027766/calcata-italian-town-lost-jesus-foreskin?utm_source=rss_feed Fri, 14 Oct 2016 07:00:15 +0000 In the autumn of 1937, Zhang Ruishu was enjoying a rare break from his 14-hour days on the frontline. One of very few, if not the only, Chinese in Madrid, he hadn’t asked for time off – there was so much to do – but his commander had insisted he take a break. The Spanish capital was decorated with defiant if raggedy banners reading No pasarán (“They shall not pass”) and Madrid será la tumba del fascismo (“Madrid will be the tomb of fascism”). Zhang had seen many such signs before. At a... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/1989792/chinese-volunteers-who-fought-spanish-civil-war?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/1989792/chinese-volunteers-who-fought-spanish-civil-war?utm_source=rss_feed Thu, 14 Jul 2016 23:00:45 +0000 Well-to-do Parisian author Andre Gide famously wrote, "It is only in adventure that some people succeed in knowing themselves - in finding themselves." Replace "adventure" with "a luxury resort" and Gide's observation becomes daft. Were you enlightened by your last signature spa treatment, or did you just shuffle back to the pool villa reeking of bergamot, geranium and lavender? At the end of the second of eight days spent motorcycling from Yunnan province, through Laos and northeast Thailand,... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/article/1850841/motorcycle-adventures-yunnan-angkor-bike?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/article/1850841/motorcycle-adventures-yunnan-angkor-bike?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 22 Aug 2015 15:30:30 +0000 Since its original publication in 1865, 150 years ago this year, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland has proven an enduring classic of children's literature. The ground-breaking fantasy has never been out of print since that day, has been translated into more than 170 languages, and influenced artists and pop-cultural luminaries as disparate as surrealist painter Salvador Dali, filmmaker Tim Burton, fashion designer Vivienne Westwood and Beatle John Lennon. Telling the tale of a bored but... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/books/article/1826720/down-rabbit-hole-150-years-alices-adventures-wonderland?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/books/article/1826720/down-rabbit-hole-150-years-alices-adventures-wonderland?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 27 Jun 2015 14:45:30 +0000 Behind the window's dust-dulled glass, unblinking eyes stare from decapitated heads. Severed arms, legs, hands and feet hang in bunches from rusty nails. The little shop of horrors, known locally as the Ospedale delle Bambole, or Rome's "Hospital of the Dolls", was established by the Squatriti family more than six decades ago. Cracked paint peels from the weathered window frame of the "hospital". Inside, Federico Squatriti, 52, and his 82-year-old mother, Gelsomina, continue a family tradition... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/article/1796248/romes-little-shop-horrors-dolls-hospital-tourism-draw?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/article/1796248/romes-little-shop-horrors-dolls-hospital-tourism-draw?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 16 May 2015 14:45:30 +0000 In 2012, the world's news media gleefully reported that a Thai cookbook - in fierce competition with Estonian Sock Patterns All Around the World and A Century of Sand Dredging in the Bristol Channel - had won a prize for the world's oddest book title. The giggle-inducing Cooking with Poo was the work of Saiyuud Diwong, who is better known by her nickname (which is short for Chompoo, or "rose apple" in Thai) and a resident of Klong Toey, the largest and most notorious slum in Bangkok. At the... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/food-wine/article/1767764/how-cookery-school-thai-slum-became-international-success?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/food-wine/article/1767764/how-cookery-school-thai-slum-became-international-success?utm_source=rss_feed Thu, 16 Apr 2015 23:00:30 +0000 Film director Oliver Stone (Natural Born Killers, 1994), novelist J. G. Ballard (The Atrocity Exhibition, 1970), and singer Courtney Love's band Hole (Celebrity Skin, 1998) tackle the issue of celebrity. Natural Born Killers Woody Harrelson, Juliette Lewis, Robert Downey Jnr Director: Oliver Stone It's a horrible hybrid - a seedy mix of social media, reality TV and plain old hubris. All combined, the result is what we call "celebrity culture", a fascinating train wreck that shocks as much as it... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/1755112/nostalgia-trip-three-takes-theme-celebrity?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/1755112/nostalgia-trip-three-takes-theme-celebrity?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 04 Apr 2015 14:30:45 +0000 Two Asian teams have qualified to compete in Italy against the world's foremost gelato artisans for the title World's Best Gelato. They'll be joined by a team from Adelaide, Australia. The regional gelato wizards triumphed in the Asia-Pacific heat of the Gelato World Tour competition, which travels the globe to track down the most perfectly executed flavour expressions of Italy's ultimate feel-good treat. Held over three days last month at Singapore's Marina Bay Sands resort, the contest drew 16... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/food-drink/article/1754255/mango-purple-yam-pandan-yuzu-tofu-gelatos-get-asian-spin?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/food-drink/article/1754255/mango-purple-yam-pandan-yuzu-tofu-gelatos-get-asian-spin?utm_source=rss_feed Thu, 02 Apr 2015 22:15:00 +0000 Angela’s Ashes: A Memoir by Frank McCourt Scribner The word "warmth" barely appears in Irish-American author Frank McCourt's tragi-comic memoir, Angela's Ashes. A comfortable temperature plays a central role, largely because of the narrator's near-constant lack of it and his incessant desire for it. Supposedly autobiographical (it won the 1997 Pulitzer Prize in the biography or autobiography category), Angela's Ashes is an unflinching account of a deprived childhood. Told in first person, it is... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/books/article/1748488/angelas-ashes-frank-mccourt-childhood-frozen-time?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/books/article/1748488/angelas-ashes-frank-mccourt-childhood-frozen-time?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 28 Mar 2015 14:51:44 +0000 Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe W. Taylor Daniel Defoe, author of the first and best-known survival novel in the English language, was a survivor himself. Born around 1660, he lived through 1665's Great Plague of London, in which 100,000 people - 25 per cent of the population - perished. The next year, his family's house was one of only three in their neighbourhood left standing after the Great Fire of London. Jack-of-all-trades Defoe was a trader with questionable business practices, a spy for... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/books/article/1736621/book-appreciation-robinson-crusoe-daniel-defoes-tale-redemption?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/books/article/1736621/book-appreciation-robinson-crusoe-daniel-defoes-tale-redemption?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 14 Mar 2015 14:41:35 +0000 "Filming at Bletchley Park was amazing," actor Benedict Cumberbatch said of his leading-man role in The Imitation Game. Based on the true story of pioneering computer scientist Alan Turing, the multiple Oscar-nominated movie depicts a race against time to decipher secret German military communications during the second world war. "It really was very special. You really feel like you're playing slightly with ghosts." Secreted away on the edge of London satellite town Milton Keynes, the low-key... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/article/1710686/bletchley-park-now-you-can-decode-enigma-country-estate?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/article/1710686/bletchley-park-now-you-can-decode-enigma-country-estate?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 14 Feb 2015 14:30:15 +0000 Glassworks Philip Glass CBS Philip Glass, who turned 78 yesterday, is one of a loose-knit group of experimental composers who pioneered the minimalist style in the 1960s. The American has long since distanced himself from the label, preferring to describe himself as a composer of "music with repetitive structures". While Glass' contemporaries La Monte Young, Terry Riley and Steve Reich all achieved varying levels of success and recognition, Glass is the most widely known, at least partly due... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/1695565/glassworks-album-set-composer-philip-glass-path-renown?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/1695565/glassworks-album-set-composer-philip-glass-path-renown?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 31 Jan 2015 15:47:21 +0000 Steal This Book by Abbie Hoffman Pirate Editions A social activist in the US in the late 1960s, Abbie Hoffman co-founded the Youth International Party - a radical offshoot of countercultural and anti-war movements - in 1967. With street theatre and pranks (the group put forward a pig as a candidate for the presidency in 1968), the "Yippies" were sometimes ridiculed as "Groucho Marxists". In Steal This Book, Hoffman rages against everything from false advertising and greedy corporations to... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/books/article/1677876/steal-book-abbie-hoffman-looking-back-rebels-guide?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/books/article/1677876/steal-book-abbie-hoffman-looking-back-rebels-guide?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 10 Jan 2015 14:45:00 +0000 When the Berlin Wall fell - 25 years ago to the day, on November 9, 1989 - the world celebrated the demise of a loathed fortification that, since 1961, had divided the German city with barbed wire, watchtowers, snarling dogs and shoot-to-kill orders. Extending 155 kilometres, the wall divided families and provided a stark face to the miseries of the cold war. Once the dust had settled, more than 40,000 segments of the wall were unceremoniously crushed to make materials for roads. The hated... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/1634294/demolished-25-years-ago-berlin-wall-legend-lives?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/1634294/demolished-25-years-ago-berlin-wall-legend-lives?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 08 Nov 2014 15:15:00 +0000 If all has gone to plan, the people of Barcelona and the rest of Catalonia will vote today to decide whether to seek independence. Though the unofficial ballot will be purely symbolic, should it take place, many here wish to be free of Spain and go their own way, and recent weeks have seen increasing numbers of Senyera-patterned flags being hung from wrought-iron balconies across the city. The red and yellow-striped standard is distinctive, flamboyant and eye-catching, and a perfect fit for the... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/article/1633352/barcelona-divine-innovation?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/article/1633352/barcelona-divine-innovation?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 08 Nov 2014 14:15:30 +0000 Low-budget movie The Trip to Italy was an unlikely indie sleeper hit this year, thanks largely to its two stars' quick-fire impersonations of Michael Caine, Al Pacino, Anthony Hopkins and other silver-screen notables. The mockumentary's central conceit sees semi-fictionalised versions of British comics Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon flaunting their mimicry skills while on a road trip of the culture-rich Mediterranean nation. Along the way, Coogan and Brydon retrace the European "Grand Tour" steps... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/article/1622865/remains-day?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/article/1622865/remains-day?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 25 Oct 2014 14:30:15 +0000 Dylan Thomas never visited China during his short lifetime. The Welsh poet and writer - most noted for his innovative, rhythmic use of words and intoxicating imagery - did, however, refer to the country in a revised version of his Reminiscences of Childhood, which he read aloud on radio in 1945, and again in 1953, the year of his death. "I was born in a large Welsh town at the beginning of the Great War, an ugly, lovely town - or so it was and is to me - crawling, sprawling by a long and... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/books/article/1618444/celebrating-centenary-poet-dylan-thomas-birth?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/books/article/1618444/celebrating-centenary-poet-dylan-thomas-birth?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 18 Oct 2014 16:00:30 +0000 The Keys of the Kingdom Gregory Peck, Thomas Mitchell, Vincent Price Director: John M. Stahl The week before Hollywood leading man Gregory Peck died in 2003 at the age of 87, the American Film Institute named the character Atticus Finch - the dignified, small-town lawyer that Peck played so brilliantly to win a best-actor Oscar in 1962's To Kill a Mockingbird - as the greatest movie hero of all time. The role was the highlight of an illustrious career, with Peck's forte being quietly... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/1608856/rewind-film-keys-kingdom-directed-john-m-stahl-1944?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/1608856/rewind-film-keys-kingdom-directed-john-m-stahl-1944?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 04 Oct 2014 15:16:05 +0000 Earlier this month, 70,000 gelato enthusiasts converged on a small park in Rimini, Italy, to scoff down 6.5 tonnes of the country's favourite feel-good treat in just three days. Like Barolo, Gucci and Ferrari, gelato is quintessentially Italian and an essential component of la dolce vita. Italians take gelato culture seriously. Call it ice cream at your peril - artisanal gelato is healthier and has a much lower fat content than the mass-produced indulgence. So it's hardly surprising that the... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/food-drink/article/1595423/gelato-champs-churn-out-taste-good-life?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/food-drink/article/1595423/gelato-champs-churn-out-taste-good-life?utm_source=rss_feed Fri, 19 Sep 2014 05:20:41 +0000 Home to the first university in Europe, and seemingly a magnet for nicknames, the enchanting city of Bologna is affectionately referred to in Italy as La Dotta, or "the learned one". It has also been dubbed La Grassa - "the fat one" - in recognition of the local appetite for eating exceptionally well. Bologna, then, is the perfect place in which to get to grips with the science behind Italy's favourite feel-good treat. Established much more recently than the venerable University of Bologna... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/article/1550933/school-cool-study-italys-most-famous-dessert-carpigiani?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/article/1550933/school-cool-study-italys-most-famous-dessert-carpigiani?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 12 Jul 2014 15:15:30 +0000 Rocket to Russia The Ramones Sire Records It's amusing to think of The Ramones - Joey, Johnny, Dee Dee and Tommy - as brothers. They were, for one, the snarling, dysfunctional response of a poverty and crime-riddled New York City in the mid-1970s to Utah's wholesome Osmonds. And in reality, the family moniker (a misappropriation of Paul Ramon, a pseudonym used by Beatle Paul McCartney early in his career) was an affectation adopted to suggest unity of purpose: the four original members were... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/1396654/rewind-album-rocket-russia-ramones?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/1396654/rewind-album-rocket-russia-ramones?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 05 Jan 2014 08:14:13 +0000 On October 31, 1938, The New York Times carried a front-page report describing panic that had spread across the city, the state and the country the previous evening. "Throughout New York families left their homes, some to flee to nearby parks," the article stated. "Thousands of persons called the police, newspapers and radio stations here and in other cities of the United States and Canada seeking advice on protective measures against the raids." In Newark, in neighbouring New Jersey, the... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/article/1345293/panic-attack-75th-anniversary-orson-welles-war-worlds-broadcast?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/article/1345293/panic-attack-75th-anniversary-orson-welles-war-worlds-broadcast?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 03 Nov 2013 09:37:08 +0000 The Lover by Marguerite Duras Les Editions de Minuit Set against the backdrop of French-administered Vietnam in the first half of the 20th century, The Lover ( L'Amant, in its original French) is a semi-autobiographical novel of less than 100 pages. It has been praised for its sparse, detached and yet impressionistic prose style. Its more rabid detractors, however, claim the book excuses, even glorifies, statutory rape. The Lover's author, Marguerite Duras, was born in Saigon in 1914 and spent... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/1300595/rewind-book-lover?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/1300595/rewind-book-lover?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 31 Aug 2013 16:00:00 +0000 The Harder They Come Jimmy Cliff, Janet Bartley, Basil Keane Director: Perry Henzell Making its debut at the 1972 Venice Film Festival, one year before the release of The Wailers' breakthrough reggae album Catch a Fire, The Harder They Come has been called the first feature-length film made in Jamaica by Jamaicans. It is certainly one of the first homegrown movies to achieve international acclaim. The film's success can largely be attributed to the soundtrack, which sells well to this day and... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/article/1293824/rewind-film-harder-they-come-directed-perry-henzell?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/article/1293824/rewind-film-harder-they-come-directed-perry-henzell?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 03 Aug 2013 16:00:00 +0000 The Anarchist Cookbook by William Powell Lyle Stuart Inc In the closing year of the 1960s, with the positivity and warm buzz of 1967's "summer of love" fading into memory, youthful tempers across the US were fraying. With no end in sight to the unpopular war in Vietnam, more than a few followers of the counter-cultural movement, who only months earlier had espoused peace and brotherly love, had become increasingly antsy. In 1968 and 1969, more than 100 politically motivated bombings were... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/books/article/1286231/rewind-book-anarchist-cookbook-william-powell?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/books/article/1286231/rewind-book-anarchist-cookbook-william-powell?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 20 Jul 2013 16:00:00 +0000 Bundled up against the spring chill in a man’s voluminous jacket and knitted woollen hat, Yang Zhaoshi perches on a rattan chair in the courtyard of her family’s ramshackle ancestral home. Hunched and increasingly deaf with her advancing years, she leans forward unsteadily to hear a question that is never easy to ask of a lady. “I can’t really remember how old I am,” Yang responds slowly. “But I know I was born in the Year of the Ox.” “Mother will be 100 in a week or two, I think,” says Yang’s... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/article/1259246/honour-bound?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/article/1259246/honour-bound?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 15 Jun 2013 16:00:00 +0000 Dial M for Murder Ray Milland, Grace Kelly, Robert Cummings Director: Alfred Hitchcock Alfred Hitchcock's 1954 thriller begins, even before the opening credits, with a full-screen shot of one of those old, invariably black, Bakelite telephones. The iconic contraption sits on the desk in the drawing room of a luxury London flat - the home of retired tennis pro and social climber Tony Wendice (Ray Milland), and his beautiful heiress wife, Margot (a chic Grace Kelly). Discovering that, while he... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/1245066/rewind-film-dial-m-murder-directed-alfred-hitchcock?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/1245066/rewind-film-dial-m-murder-directed-alfred-hitchcock?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 25 May 2013 16:00:00 +0000 Soylent Green Charlton Heston, Leigh Taylor-Young, Chuck Connors Director: Richard Fleischer Imagine a world so ravaged by runaway population growth and unchecked pollution that natural resources have been exhausted, and civil society has broken down; where the wealth gap has spiralled to an all-time high; where fresh food is a luxury and the masses survive on a diet of processed junk containing … well, who truly knows what? Loosely based on the 1966 novel Make Room! Make Room! by American... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/1234486/rewind-film-soylent-green-directed-richard-fleischer?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/1234486/rewind-film-soylent-green-directed-richard-fleischer?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 11 May 2013 16:00:00 +0000