Monocle on Saturday, July 29, 2023: A look at the week’s news and culture with Georgina Godwin.
We’re joined by the deputy publishing editor of ‘Newsweek’, Paul Rhodes, to flick through the morning’s papers and Monocle’s culture editor, Chiara Rimella, guides us through Italian beach club culture.
THE NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE (July 30, 2023) – In this week’s cover story, David Quammen reports on the ongoing mystery of Covid’s origin, what we do know — and why it matters. Plus, a profile of a poet who was kidnapped from his Black father by his white grandparents and a look at a group of English activists’ fight for the right to access public lands.
We still don’t know how the pandemic started. Here’s what we do know — and why it matters.
By David Quammen
Where did it come from? More than three years into the pandemic and untold millions of people dead, that question about the Covid-19 coronavirus remains controversial and fraught, with facts sparkling amid a tangle of analyses and hypotheticals like Christmas lights strung on a dark, thorny tree. One school of thought holds that the virus, known to science as SARS-CoV-2, spilled into humans from a nonhuman animal, probably in the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, a messy emporium in Wuhan, China, brimming with fish, meats and wildlife on sale as food. Another school argues that the virus was laboratory-engineered to infect humans and cause them harm — a bioweapon — and was possibly devised in a “shadow project” sponsored by the People’s Liberation Army of China.
A group of English activists want to legally enshrine the “right to roam” — and spread the idea that nature is a common good.
By Brooke Jarvis
The signs on the gate at the entrance to the path and along the edge of the reservoir were clear. “No swimming,” they warned, white letters on a red background.
On a chill mid-April day in northwest England, with low, gray clouds and rain in the forecast, the signs hardly seemed necessary. But then people began arriving, by the dozens and then the hundreds. Some walked only from nearby Hayfield, while others came by train or bus or foot from many hours away. In a long, trailing line, they tramped up the hill beside the dam and around the shore of the reservoir, slipping in mud and jumping over puddles. Above them rose a long, curving hill of open moorland, its heather still winter brown. When they came to a gap between a stone wall and a metal fence, they squeezed through it, one by one, slipping under strings of barbed wire toward the water below.
1843 MAGAZINE – SUMMER STORIES 2023:
As rival candidates are lined up, the Tibetan spiritual leader tells Brook Larmer what he really thinks of China
Young soldiers have buoyed the country’s fight for freedom, but at great cost. Irena Long meets them in their jungle hideout
Criminals stole $2.5bn from Iraq’s largest state bank in broad daylight. Nicolas Pelham follows their trail
The Globalist Podcast, Friday, July 28, 2023: President Putin concedes that Ukraine has intensified its counteroffensive as Moldova expels 45 Russian diplomatic staff over “unfriendly actions”.
Plus, Taiwan’s efforts to bolster its defense capabilities, updates on the Niger coup and an ode to the pleasures of skinny dipping.
Companies are increasingly caught up in governments’ competing aims. What to do?
Here is how to get him to sign up again
But there are still ways to step back from the brink
The Globalist Podcast, Thursday, July 27, 2023: The Russia-Africa summit begins in St Petersburg. Also, Cambodia’s prime minister, Hun Sen, announces his resignation and the country’s first new leader since 1985.
Plus, a check-in from the Women’s World Cup and a flick through the day’s papers.
The Guardian Weekly (July 28, 2023) – Has Vox’s far-right bubble popped? The gridlocked reign in Spain. Plus: Goodbye to Britain’s fish and chips?
Socialist leader assures party ‘democracy can find a formula for government’ as left and right blocs try to form viable coalitions
The Spanish Socialist leader, Pedro Sánchez, has ruled out a return to the polls following Sunday’s inconclusive snap general election, insisting a new government can be formed after his ruling coalition was narrowly beaten by the opposition conservative People’s party (PP).
Plenty of people will tell you the East Neuk of Fife in Scotland is the best place in the world to eat fish and chips. So what happens when its chippies – and chippies across the UK – start to close?
The Globalist Podcast, Wednesday, July 26, 2023: The Belarusian ministry of emergency situations is arming its personnel to prepare for potential armed conflict.
Plus, we discuss why crime in Ecuador is increasing ahead of the country’s elections in August, the latest in the world of aviation and investigate what Elon Musk is up to over at Twitter HQ.
The Globalist Podcast, Tuesday, July 25, 2023: Israel passes a controversial bill to limit the Supreme Court’s power. Plus: French president Emmanuel Macron’s Pacific tour, Cambodia’s one-horse election race, and, as thousands of people are evacuated from Greek islands, we ask: how do repatriation flights work?
‘Editor’s Picks’ Podcast (July 24, 2023) – Three essential articles read aloud from the latest issue of The Economist. This week: a report on the technology behind babymaking, why optimism about the world economy might be premature (10:30), and what the hype over Barbenheimer says about the movie industry (16:17).
