The Critical Commentator

  Feast of Fools Frans Floris the elder (c.1517-1570) Photo Credit: Shakespeare Birthplace Trust [CC BY-NC-ND] Where once he was the most interesting Hamlet of his generation, he is now the most interesting Prospero.  As with Goethe or Beethoven or Picasso, the late works stand as measured and resonant equal to the raw, intense virtuosity of his unsurpassable early output. (Edward Docx, The Guardian, 2021, in Private Eye, No 1549 ) Brendan Rogers -Manager Of Leicester City But then, this has always been the basic and fascinating paradox of Rodgers: an artifice that has always been underpinned by a strong sense of authenticity, an authenticity that owes so much of its potency to artifice. This tension - between bombast and insecurity, style and substance, the holistic guru who just wants you to be the best person who can be and the self-publicist with a vaunting personal ambition and a habit of leaving his clubs abruptly - is the defining note of a career that has taken him fro...

  People An heiress to the Disney family fortune has excoriated the media giant’s treatment of its workers after she made an undercover visit to Disneyland and found misery in the self-styled “happiest place on earth”. Abigail Disney, 59, is hoping that her intervention will shame the Walt Disney Company and its well-rewarded chief executive, Robert Iger, 68, into improving conditions for staff who earn, on average, less than a thousandth of his pay package. Despair ,  Eric Harald Macbeth Robertson (1887-1941) Photo Credit: Glasgow Museums [CC BY-NC-ND] Her trip to the theme park in Anaheim, southern California, was prompted by a despairing Facebook message from an employee there and came after a survey last year by a group of unions, which revealed that nearly three quarters of workers did not earn enough to pay for basic expenses and more than half feared eviction from their homes. Ms Disney left the park angry at what she regarded as a betrayal of the principles espoused by...

  Kate Swan, the boss of the airport and station retailer SSP Group has suffered a shareholder revolt over her £6.2 million pay package as she prepares to leave in May after six years. She has been paid a total of £22.4 million since she lead SSP to a float in 2014. She holds shares worth £40.3 million. (The Times, 2019)                             Have the shareholders woken up at last? The Lords Studies made in the House of Lords John Lavery (1856-1941) Photo Credit: The Fitzwilliam Museum [CC BY-NC-ND] One in five members of the House of Lords work as consultants or advisors to private businesses while serving in parliament. An analysis by the Guardian of the register of Lords’ interests shows 169 peers reported they were working as advisors this year, and more than a dozen said they were paid by foreign governments in addition to the expenses they are entitled to as peers. The consultancies range from a ...

  The Fugitives,    Honoré Daumier (1808-1879) Photo Credit: Glasgow Museums [CC By-NC-ND]                                       In Arizona …, a jury was unable to reach a verdict on Scott Daniel Warren, a college lecturer accused of conspiracy to transport and harbour migrants after providing them with food and shelter.  He faced up to 20 years in jail. He may still do if there's a retrial.   Meanwhile in Sicily, Pia Klemp, the German captain of the boat Sea-Watch 3, was charged with assisting in illegal immigration after rescuing migrants in distress in the Mediterranean. She, too, faces up to 20 years in prison. Warren and Kemp are the latest victims of a disturbing trend that has gone almost unnoticed: the threat by the authorities on both sides of the Atlantic to put on trial anyone who provides rescue or humanitarian help for migrants.  An investigation by t...

  Hopepunk Hope ,  George Frederick Watts (1817-1904) (and assistants) Photo Credit: Tate [CC BY-NC-ND] Anxious about the state of the world? Afraid of ecological apocalypse? Then “hopepunk” could be just the thing. Young people feel so overwhelmed by the bleakness of their existence that they no longer crave dark dramas, according to a senior BBC executive. Instead, the corporation is embracing a new genre of storytelling that emphasises positivity and kindness and has set aside £150,000 for an audio series to reflect it. Hopepunk…has been described as “weaponised optimism”, combining gentleness with the fight for social change. (The Times, 2019) Should I be anxious about not being anxious? As an American acquaintance once said to me gravely, many years ago: “If you ain’t got a problem you’ve got a serious problem.” He didn’t think it funny when I started laughing. What top Chief Marketing Officers say Amanda St L Jobbins, Oracle The Charlatan ,  unknown artist Photo Cre...

  Merit Francesco Guardi (1712-1793) Photo Credit: Walker Art Gallery [CC BY-NC] ...Our present version of meritocracy is profoundly corrupted by money. Rich parents have proved highly successful at buying superior education for their children either by sending them to private schools or moving near superior state schools... But the solution to this is surely more meritocracy rather than less; giving academy schools more freedom to select on the basis of ability; forcing private schools to give free places to, say, half of their pupils on the basis of their pure brain-power and improving vocational education so that people who don't flourish in academic schools have an attractive alternative... (Adrian Woolridge, The Times, 2021) Could not private schools become centres of excellence in an individual area - Maths, English, Science, Art, Music, Sport, Technology etc? Entrance would be determined by potential in that area and not by background or ability to pay. Fees would be means t...

  A Singer with a Donkey Guiseppe Maria Crespi (1665-1747) Photo Credit:Manchester Art Gallery [CC BY-NC-ND] The "pet baby boom" triggered by the Covid pandemic has translated into soaring sales of designer fashion, homeware and even tech for cats and dogs as owners treat their animals to the same creature comforts as the humans in the household... Sales of puppy products were up by more than a quarter with customers snapping-up comforting blankets and plush beds - some complete with heat packs to make them extra cosy... Other items in demand include a £40 pet camera, a cat drinking fountain, a snip at £26, doggie paddling pools anywhere between £25-£50 and for the rugged canine, a £37 Barbour jacket... With a third of UK households now pet owners, Pritchard [Chief Executive of Pets at Home] said the "humanisation" of the way pets are treated was gathering momentum... Sales of dog coats were up by 24%. Last year's heatwave led to a 30% increase in the sale of pr...

  Health Craze in USA Portait of an Old Woman ,  unknown artist Photo Credit: South Lanarkshire Council [CC BY-NC-ND] The American drugs regulator has warned against a health craze in which people are injected with blood plasma from teenagers in the hope of slowing the ageing process and tackling degenerative diseases.  Some clinics across the country claim that these plasma transfusions can treat memory loss, tackle dementia, Parkinson’s disease, heart disease and even help people with post-traumatic stress disorder. The cost? Ambrosia Medical, in San Francisco, offered transfusions of 1 litre of plasma for $8,000. However, there is almost no scientific evidence to suggest the procedure works in humans. In 2017, a clinical trial found that transfusions of young blood to 18 patients with Alzheimer’s did nothing to treat the disease. Scott Gottlieb, the Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, and Peter Marks, the director of the FDA’s centre for biologics evaluat...

  Drug Companies The Cheat Edgard Farasyn (1858-1938) Photo Credit: Walker Art Gallery [CC BY-NC] Two drug companies have been accused of breaking the law by carving up the market to keep prices for an antibiotic artificially high. The competition watchdog has provisionally ruled that Advanz Pharma and Morningside reached a deal with the wholesaler Alliance Healthcare so that they would not compete in the market for nitrofurantoin capsules between 2014 and 2017. The medicine, for urinary tract infections, underwent a five-fold price increase in this time. …During this period the price to the NHS of the 50mg version of the medicine rose from £3.66 in early 2014 to £15.42 at the end of 2016, and a packet of 100mg capsules went from £6.91 to £10.42. …It is the latest case conducted by the regulator where it has accused drug companies of breaking competition law by striking deals or abusing a dominant market position to sustain or raise prices. …The government passed legislation in 201...