Tag: james bembridge

Character-Building

A Memorandum on the Perils of a Gullible Mind (Part 2)

BY THE EDITOR This is Part 2 of a two-part article that began yesterday. Part 1 can be read here. The situation escalated when Roger invited Bembers to his birthday party (ten years older than his actual age)—a milestone event that placed him squarely in what Bembers deemed “Bible John age territory.” For Bembers, this was the missing key. He launched a full-scale investigation, scouring … Continue reading A Memorandum on the Perils of a Gullible Mind (Part 2)

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Character-Building

A Memorandum on the Perils of a Gullible Mind (Part 1)

BY THE EDITOR As Editor of this esteemed publication, my duties are many and varied. I am a curator of fine prose, a guardian of grammatical fortitude, and a shepherd to a flock of writers who, while brilliant, occasionally possess the common sense of a startled pheasant. It is, therefore, paramount that my successor, the ever-keen Deputy Editor James ‘Bembers’ Bembridge, possesses a quality even … Continue reading A Memorandum on the Perils of a Gullible Mind (Part 1)

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Writing

A Christmas Miracle

BY JAMES BEMBRIDGE ‘Just write,’ my editor said. What a load of Woman’s-Weekly-self-helping bollocks. Did Monet just paint? Did Whitney Houston just sing?  Did Jemma Jameson just wiggle that tremendous arse of hers? I think not. That arse made men pawns to her star, just as my writing will make – ‘You’re disgusting!’ some small, hen-faced woman says, and I realise I’m thinking aloud again … Continue reading A Christmas Miracle

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The Magazine

100,000

THE SQUIRES Dear Opponents, If you said we would never succeed, you were mistaken; if you claimed we would fail, you were in error; if you predicted we would falter, you underestimated our fortitude. If you declared our ideas too bold, too radical, or too detached, you failed to grasp our vision. If you deemed our goals unachievable, our mission impossible, or our ambition excessive, … Continue reading 100,000

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Books

The Secret

BY JAMES BEMBRIDGE 12:30 pm, The Beaujolais, Soho. A meeting with Cloe. Behind us, a table of lunching women –  that is, women who don’t lunch. About their bones, dresses hang like sheets caught on a telephone pole. One braves a grain of mozzarella, hesitates on it, and then returns it to the plate. ‘Filling, isn’t it?’ she asks. The plate is one of two … Continue reading The Secret

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editorial

The Plastic Chancellor

CSM EDITORIAL The Squires chose to ‘do a Cummings’ this week and, out of a deep sense of public service, visited a series of public houses to survey public opinion. (Conveniently for the Deputy Editor, this exercise amounted to working from home). Today, Chancellor Rachel Reeves will claim that the Sunak government left no money and an economy on the brink, telling Parliament that the … Continue reading The Plastic Chancellor

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London

Boom Boom

BY DOMINIC WIGHTMAN Last Friday night, deep in a den of iniquity on Soho’s Frith Street, it occurred to me that the boom-boom and boom-booms of nightclubs no longer appeal to me. The days of waking up at midnight in my bachelor flat on Great Titchfield Street and thinking it a fair scheme to pop by Bar Madrid for tequila and tango were already distant. … Continue reading Boom Boom

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editorial, Energy

Solar Perplexes Us: Britain Needs a Solar Farm Cap

CSM EDITORIAL Those companies selling solar panels to farmers to place in their fields have – like all good salespeople – addressed the likely objections: They argue that solar panel structures preserve agricultural land, that planning permission for a solar farm is time-limited, and installations can be completely dismantled at the end of their operation. Solar does not take agricultural land, they say, it borrows … Continue reading Solar Perplexes Us: Britain Needs a Solar Farm Cap

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Health

Hard Massage

BY JAMES BEMBRIDGE I am being admitted to a health spa today at my friend’s insistence. Before Health, there’s no word more offensive to my ear. How people can faff about with cabbage soup, yogic meditation or whatever the hell else it is these fanatics get up to, I’ll never know. And why is it that ‘wellness’ gurus always look so ghastly ill? I suppose … Continue reading Hard Massage

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Books, Reviews

The New Puritans

BY JAMES BEMBRIDGE As opening sentences go, ‘You f*cking Nazi c*nt,’ takes some beating. This was the charge made against Andrew Doyle not by some faceless internet troll but by an old friend to whose son he is the godfather. A left-wing homosexual with a doctorate in early Renaissance poetry, Doyle makes an unlikely flagbearer for fascism. In fact, it’s hard to imagine anyone to … Continue reading The New Puritans

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