April 2020

April 2020 issue

Inside the Scottish town built on the arms trade. Plus: What Keir Starmer really believes, a history of Virago, and Thomas Piketty's new theory of everything

Past issues

Essays

Omar al Bashir, President of Sudan, just after he took power from Sadiq al Mahdi, in front of his palace on the Nile River.

Demise of a dictator: How will the world remember Sudan's Omar al-Bashir?

A story of arms, work and Britain's responsibility overseas. Image: Prospect graphic

Making a killing: Inside the Scottish town built on the arms trade

Why do so many teenage girls want to change gender?

Programs like ITV's Butterfly show how transition can be life-changing.

Forget the moral panic—early treatment for trans children could be life-saving

Stephen Whittle

“Big Phil” instinctively knows how to build useful relationships Photo: CHRISTOPH SOEDER/DPA/PA IMAGES

Will this man break Brexit Britain?

ERIC PIERMONT/AFP via Getty Images

Thomas Piketty's capital idea

Just who is Keir Starmer? Photo: Tim McDonagh

What does Keir Starmer believe?

Regulars

Prospect editorial: Masters of war

Letters: April 2020

Hannah Berry's cartoon: School payback

Click to enlarge

Stephen Collins's cartoon: a fascinating maverick genius

Stephen Collins

The Prospect puzzle and crossword: April 2020

Pensions report: 50 shades of grey

Pensions—a lot done, much more still to do

Margaret Greenwood

Embargoed to 0001 Thursday February 27 File photo dated 12/09/18 showing models of elderly people on a pile of coins and bank notes.Pension savers are struggling to track down and understand their retirement pots, according to Which?

Pensions—stop the residual rip-offs and put the customer first

Should we rejoin the EU now?

Will Hutton and Patience Wheatcroft

Chief Secretary to the Treasury Rishi Sunak leaving BBC Broadcasting House in central London after appearing on The Andrew Marr Show. PA Photo. Picture date: Sunday December 15, 2019. See PA story POLITICS Election. Photo credit should read: Hollie Adams/

Why those saving for old age face a shroud of complexity

The midlife slump is real—but more complicated than we might imagine. Photo: Prospect composite

Midlife crisis? Data reveals the real story of the middle-age slump

David Blanchflower

Peter Singer: My little-known family altercation with Freud

Opinions

Prime Minister Boris Johnson speaks during a press conference, at 10 Downing Street, in London, on the government's coronavirus action plan.

What's behind the west's populist wave?

Khan and Burnham have succeeded where their national party has failed. Photo: Stefan Rousseau/PA Archive/PA Images

Can mayors save Labour? How Sadiq Khan and Andy Burnham show the path back to power

PA Archive/PA Images

Saving for retirement—when perseverance pays

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal displays his ink-marked finger after casting his ballot during the Delhi State Assembly Elections. Credit: Arish Tyagi/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock

Even when Narendra Modi loses, he wins

Has WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus sent contradictory signals? Photo: Zheng Huansong/Xinhua News Agency/PA Images

The unpalatable lesson of coronavirus: dictatorships can be effective

Elizabeth Pisani

Photo: SOPA Images/SIPA USA/PA Images

How the myth of judicial activism has taken on a life of its own

David Allen Green

Arts & Books

Directed by Dominic Hill, the Scottish Opera's new production of Midsummer Night's Dream is set to a heady, meticulously crafted score.

The best classical and opera this April 2020—Rodelinda at the Barbican and Scottish Opera's does A Midsummer's Night Dream

Alexandra Coghlan

First Street in Harare Photo: Gary Bembridge, Flickr

What Tambu did next

Alex Peake-Tomkinson

Alice Vincent wants us to get our hands dirty Image: detail of book cover

Why are millennials so obsessed with gardening?

Clara Hernanz-Lizarraga

A mother and baby in Chinatown, Limehouse in the 1920s

A love letter to London, city of migrants

Maya Goodfellow

Photo: ©The Other Richard

The best theatre to watch this April—4000 Miles at the Old Vic and The War of the Worlds at NST City

Michael Coveney

SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon with Gordon candidate Alex Salmond during a visit to to the Dreams Daycare nursery in Insch, Aberdeenshire, on the election campaign trail.

A new book reveals the risks of Scottish independence

The best films in April 2020—the Radioactive story of Marie Curie and Rocks

The new "Bite of the Apple" collection goes inside the history of Virago. Photo: Prospect composite

How Virago blew up the canon

A woman takes a selfie with Speaker of the House of Commons, John Bercow. Photo: PA

In defence of John Bercow

Saudi Arabia versus Iran—the conflict tearing the Middle East apart

Karin von Hippel

Labour MP David Lammy speaks during a rally in Parliament Square as hundreds of thousands of people take part in the anti-Brexit 'Together for the Final Say' march through central London to demand a public vote on the outcome of Brexit on 19 October, 2019

David Lammy's plan to fight political polarisation

In Something Rhymes with Purple, Gyles Brandreth and Susie Dent explore unusual words and their surprising etymologies in each episode

The best podcasts in April 2020—BBC's Fake Heiress and Corbynism re-visited

Charlotte Runcie

EMBARGOED UNTIL 00.01 ON Friday the 15th November. ITV QUIZ First Look at Michael Sheen as Chris Tarrant in ‘Quiz’ coming to ITV and AMC next year Quiz tells the extraordinary and sensational story of how Charles and Diana Ingram attempted an ‘audaciou

The best television in April 2020—A Russian Spy Story and BBC Four's Art Mysteries

Who was the real Andy Warhol?

Emma Crichton-Miller

The best art in April 2020—Artemisia at the National Gallery and Zanele Muholi at Tate Modern

Emma Crichton-Miller

Mantel's final Cromwell novel is superbly accomplished—but ultimately wearying

Society and Culture

Illustration: Kate Hazell

The rise of audiobook snobbery—and what it's really about

Caroline O'Donoghue

Vermouth in a glass

“Begin with a Vermouth Amaro in lieu of a cocktail...” Memorable meals recalled by famous names

Photo: Nicholas Parsons presenting an edition of BBC Radio 4's Just a Minute. Steve Bowbrick (Flickr)

How "Just a Minute" and "I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue" taught me what it means to be English

Benjamin Markovits

Pensions report: 50 shades of grey

Embargoed to 0001 Thursday February 27 File photo dated 12/09/18 showing models of elderly people on a pile of coins and bank notes.Pension savers are struggling to track down and understand their retirement pots, according to Which?

Pensions—stop the residual rip-offs and put the customer first

Illustration: Kate Hazell

"My mind was a mess"—how an afternoon spent rockpooling taught me to slow down

Illustration: Kate Hazell

The tragedy of the lost Classics—mourning the Greek and Roman works of literature we'll never get to read

Charlotte Higgins

Illustration: Kate Hazell

Children accept the changing shape of family—it's grown-ups who are the problem

Hephzibah Anderson