Kate Phillips
@andanotherkate.bsky.social
Look what your god has done to me
There are an awful lot of people in British society whom I am ready never to hear from again, but I think this dickhead would crack the top ten.
Multimillionaire Brexiter, Tim Martin, urges pubs to back Reform. Just like he urged the country to vote for Brexit. Too bad if it makes you poorer. Too bad for the children he’ll push back into poverty. Tim wants more money. And he couldn’t give a shit about the cost for everybody else.
(iPaper)
(iPaper)
February 10, 2026 at 11:22 AM
There are an awful lot of people in British society whom I am ready never to hear from again, but I think this dickhead would crack the top ten.
He looks like he learned to smile by reading about it in a book - but, in fairness, it’s not an expression he’ll have been used to seeing on anyone else’s face when he walks in.
It’s practically a work of art that he thinks we’re all that stupid.
February 9, 2026 at 10:28 PM
He looks like he learned to smile by reading about it in a book - but, in fairness, it’s not an expression he’ll have been used to seeing on anyone else’s face when he walks in.
Reposted by Kate Phillips
And, having the east and west coasts represented, we should go down south too because this may be cheesy but it’s an absolute earworm made all the more delightful by Hasse Andersson’s skånska accent.
youtu.be/fDQRShw-Vdc?...
youtu.be/fDQRShw-Vdc?...
Hasse Andersson – Guld och gröna skogar | Melodifestivalen 2016
YouTube video by Melodifestivalen
youtu.be
February 9, 2026 at 9:26 PM
And, having the east and west coasts represented, we should go down south too because this may be cheesy but it’s an absolute earworm made all the more delightful by Hasse Andersson’s skånska accent.
youtu.be/fDQRShw-Vdc?...
youtu.be/fDQRShw-Vdc?...
Oh, and I’ll throw in Sommartider, a beloved classic in Sweden and entirely unknown outside it, from Per Gessle’s pre-Roxette band, Gyllene Tider.
youtu.be/CnBfiQyeDcI?...
youtu.be/CnBfiQyeDcI?...
Gyllene Tider - GT25 Live - Sommartider
YouTube video by Dackes1
youtu.be
February 9, 2026 at 9:21 PM
Oh, and I’ll throw in Sommartider, a beloved classic in Sweden and entirely unknown outside it, from Per Gessle’s pre-Roxette band, Gyllene Tider.
youtu.be/CnBfiQyeDcI?...
youtu.be/CnBfiQyeDcI?...
Post a banger not in English.
There is - unsurprisingly - so much great pop in Swedish but this is the first thing that came into my head.
youtu.be/f4fB9EXpMTI?...
There is - unsurprisingly - so much great pop in Swedish but this is the first thing that came into my head.
youtu.be/f4fB9EXpMTI?...
February 9, 2026 at 9:14 PM
Post a banger not in English.
There is - unsurprisingly - so much great pop in Swedish but this is the first thing that came into my head.
youtu.be/f4fB9EXpMTI?...
There is - unsurprisingly - so much great pop in Swedish but this is the first thing that came into my head.
youtu.be/f4fB9EXpMTI?...
I am shocked, shocked!, I tell you to learn that Emerald Fennell’s “WUTHERING HEIGHTS” is overwrought, simplistic and heavy-handed. Who could have seen this coming?
February 9, 2026 at 9:09 PM
I am shocked, shocked!, I tell you to learn that Emerald Fennell’s “WUTHERING HEIGHTS” is overwrought, simplistic and heavy-handed. Who could have seen this coming?
Failing this, I will settle for them being stranded at an intergalactic bus stop like people eaten by the Vortex at the end of The Adventure Game.
February 9, 2026 at 8:07 PM
Failing this, I will settle for them being stranded at an intergalactic bus stop like people eaten by the Vortex at the end of The Adventure Game.
I would really like this all to end with Wes Streeting and Luke Akehurst being covered in gunge and shaking their fists in impotent rage, like baddies in a Children’s Film Foundation movie. I’m a little vague on how we’ll get there, but it doesn’t seem too much to ask.
February 9, 2026 at 8:05 PM
I would really like this all to end with Wes Streeting and Luke Akehurst being covered in gunge and shaking their fists in impotent rage, like baddies in a Children’s Film Foundation movie. I’m a little vague on how we’ll get there, but it doesn’t seem too much to ask.
I'd never argue that everything was perfect in 1997, but in Blair's first cabinet you had Gordon Brown, Jack Straw, Robin Cook, Margaret Beckett, John Prescott, Clare Short, Mo Mowlam and Alistair Darling, all of whom had a degree of credibility. (And I always had a soft spot for Frank Dobson.)
February 9, 2026 at 3:53 PM
I'd never argue that everything was perfect in 1997, but in Blair's first cabinet you had Gordon Brown, Jack Straw, Robin Cook, Margaret Beckett, John Prescott, Clare Short, Mo Mowlam and Alistair Darling, all of whom had a degree of credibility. (And I always had a soft spot for Frank Dobson.)
(The Tories and Reform, of course, also struggle with the fact that ideologically acceptable by definition absolutely rules out competent, and mostly rules out charismatic. Which, yes, also seems to be the case for Labour at the moment, but it feels it shouldn't have to be.)
February 9, 2026 at 3:47 PM
(The Tories and Reform, of course, also struggle with the fact that ideologically acceptable by definition absolutely rules out competent, and mostly rules out charismatic. Which, yes, also seems to be the case for Labour at the moment, but it feels it shouldn't have to be.)
Labour's real problem - and it's a very strange one for a party with such an overwhelming majority - is its absolute dearth of senior talent. It's the same issue the Tories latterly had (and have), when civil war narrows your options to the ideologically acceptable over the competent or charismatic.
February 9, 2026 at 3:35 PM
Labour's real problem - and it's a very strange one for a party with such an overwhelming majority - is its absolute dearth of senior talent. It's the same issue the Tories latterly had (and have), when civil war narrows your options to the ideologically acceptable over the competent or charismatic.
Reposted by Kate Phillips
The daft thing is that with Proportional Representation there'd be no need for this self-destructive war within Labour. It could split into its component parts - left and right - and people could vote for what they wanted. It's only First-Past-the-Post that forces these irreconcilables together.
February 9, 2026 at 8:51 AM
The daft thing is that with Proportional Representation there'd be no need for this self-destructive war within Labour. It could split into its component parts - left and right - and people could vote for what they wanted. It's only First-Past-the-Post that forces these irreconcilables together.
Reposted by Kate Phillips
Get your Wuthering Heights name by calling yourself some combination of Earnshaw, Linton, Heathcliff and Catherine, and then immediately dying of TB
February 9, 2026 at 12:20 PM
Get your Wuthering Heights name by calling yourself some combination of Earnshaw, Linton, Heathcliff and Catherine, and then immediately dying of TB
I agree that War and Peace is, for the most part, an absolutely great time - but the last 75 pages or so where Tolstoy wangs on at length about his theories of history are ghastly. Reading through it felt like the air being slowly let out of a balloon as I realised the actual story was done.
Its reputation as a Big Fat Book you read to show off, or as an endurance test, does it no favours. It is, as Helen suggests, wonderful.
I'm up to page 252 of WAR AND PEACE (I'm supposed to be doing a chapter a day throughout the year but I'm a bit ahead because I can't always take it away with me when I go). I suppose trillions of readers have expressed this before me, but it's brilliant, isn't it?
February 9, 2026 at 12:31 PM
I agree that War and Peace is, for the most part, an absolutely great time - but the last 75 pages or so where Tolstoy wangs on at length about his theories of history are ghastly. Reading through it felt like the air being slowly let out of a balloon as I realised the actual story was done.
Reposted by Kate Phillips
There are legitimate disagreements about content warnings (I think they're fine) but the idea that theatre SHOULD make people uncomfortable is macho nonsense. Most theatre does not do that and people generally like to have a rough idea of what they're signing up for
Director John Doyle has claimed content warnings "mollycoddle" audiences and said theatre should make people "uncomfortable".
Read more 👇
Read more 👇
John Doyle: Content warnings are mollycoddling audiences
Director John Doyle has claimed content warnings ‘mollycoddle’ audiences and said theatre should make people ‘uncomfortable’
www.thestage.co.uk
February 8, 2026 at 3:26 PM
There are legitimate disagreements about content warnings (I think they're fine) but the idea that theatre SHOULD make people uncomfortable is macho nonsense. Most theatre does not do that and people generally like to have a rough idea of what they're signing up for
I will always see his movies on opening day, but THE PHOENICIAN SCHEME really tried my patience. It felt like the culmination of a trend where his style has become closed, stifling and self-referential and has completely lost the emotional engagement which gave his earlier films their punch.
February 9, 2026 at 10:15 AM
I will always see his movies on opening day, but THE PHOENICIAN SCHEME really tried my patience. It felt like the culmination of a trend where his style has become closed, stifling and self-referential and has completely lost the emotional engagement which gave his earlier films their punch.
It is unhelpful that one of the few remaining forces for good in British society - the ECHR - is so easily confused with one of its principal baddies, the EHRC. It feels like the set-up for an unusually high-brow farce.
February 8, 2026 at 7:17 PM
It is unhelpful that one of the few remaining forces for good in British society - the ECHR - is so easily confused with one of its principal baddies, the EHRC. It feels like the set-up for an unusually high-brow farce.
Reposted by Kate Phillips
In these dark days of February, a little something to look forward to.
February 7, 2026 at 6:42 AM
In these dark days of February, a little something to look forward to.
All of her books except the six Jackson Brodie novels are stand alone - and the Brodie novels can all be read separately, with only fairly loose connections between them (but definitely more fun to read in order if possible).
February 7, 2026 at 9:02 AM
All of her books except the six Jackson Brodie novels are stand alone - and the Brodie novels can all be read separately, with only fairly loose connections between them (but definitely more fun to read in order if possible).
I’m glad she’s well represented! (A God in Ruins and Behind the Scenes of the Museum are my favourites of hers, but I’ve read them all and there’s not a dud among them).
February 7, 2026 at 8:34 AM
I’m glad she’s well represented! (A God in Ruins and Behind the Scenes of the Museum are my favourites of hers, but I’ve read them all and there’s not a dud among them).
Reposted by Kate Phillips
To those local to me who think it can’t happen here, remember 1. The Swedish gov has contracts with Palantir 2. They “need” to do mass deportations bc of something called “integration debt” (yes, it’s ethnic cleansing) and 3. One of the main parties has made a map of where all the immigrants are.
Can you imagine being the software engineers, engineering managers, product managers, designers, QA testers, and devops that built and run this? Cashing out your palantir equity for "deportation targets"? Accomplices and ghouls, all of them
February 7, 2026 at 8:26 AM
To those local to me who think it can’t happen here, remember 1. The Swedish gov has contracts with Palantir 2. They “need” to do mass deportations bc of something called “integration debt” (yes, it’s ethnic cleansing) and 3. One of the main parties has made a map of where all the immigrants are.
Please do! If it helps bring her books to someone’s attention, that can only be a good thing; she’s wonderful.
February 7, 2026 at 8:25 AM
Please do! If it helps bring her books to someone’s attention, that can only be a good thing; she’s wonderful.
Death at the Sign of the Rook is the slightest and lightest of Kate Atkinson’s Jackson Brodie novels - a gleeful, cosily metafictional trifle compared to its often rather bleak forebears (When Will There Be Good News? is a particularly tough read) - but she couldn’t write a bad book if she tried.
February 6, 2026 at 11:00 PM
Death at the Sign of the Rook is the slightest and lightest of Kate Atkinson’s Jackson Brodie novels - a gleeful, cosily metafictional trifle compared to its often rather bleak forebears (When Will There Be Good News? is a particularly tough read) - but she couldn’t write a bad book if she tried.
Haha, in my defence I hated it before *that film* but it definitely added piquancy to my feelings. The annoying thing is that I genuinely think THE DAMNED UNITED is pretty good - but all the rest of his output is a fair reflection of the man!
February 6, 2026 at 1:48 PM
Haha, in my defence I hated it before *that film* but it definitely added piquancy to my feelings. The annoying thing is that I genuinely think THE DAMNED UNITED is pretty good - but all the rest of his output is a fair reflection of the man!