At one time, every parent and child knew all about Nativity plays. Many will have memories and photographs of tea-towel-adorned shepherds,…

M (Judi Dench) is nothing if not pragmatic. Before the opening credits of Skyfall have even rolled, she has allowed not one, but two of her…

"Make them remember you." The Doctor’s advice to Amy and Rory as they faced the Parliament of the Daleks (episode 1: 'Asylum of the…

According to the Romans, ‘bread and circuses’ were the key to keeping a population content. As long as their immediate physical…

Vincent Van Gogh is now a solid fixture in our cultural vocabulary. I need only mention sunflowers or a bandaged ear to conjure up his life…

Perhaps a society truly becomes lost when it doesn't know how lost it is. This is the eerie suggestion put forward by Never Let Me Go,…

In The Writing on the Wall, Maggi Dawn sets about doing what John Stott called "double listening" – "it means that we’re called…

I'm not sure exactly what makes someone a phenomenon, but anyone who has managed to win 62 music awards in two years and has produced a…

‘I don’t know if the story I want to tell you is entirely true,’ confesses the narrator at the opening of Michael…