Author: Taki Theodoracopulos

New York—Even after all these years, I’m still at times floored by the scale of the place. And it’s always the old reliables that stand out: the silvery arcs of the Chrysler Building; the wide avenues; the filigree of Central Park; the limestone monument to power, Rockefeller Center. The recent trend for tall, slender, and glassy housing for money-laundering Russians and Chinese curiously does not mix with the city’s motto of ever bigger and grander. It’s as if the transparency of the glass structure is teasing the authorities about the origins of the owners’ wealth. Come in and take a … Continue reading →

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My old friend and one-time doubles partner Ray Moore have stepped down as chief executive of the Indian Wells Tennis Tournament for telling the truth. As Rod Liddle wrote in The Spectator a couple of weeks ago, “There is nothing more damaging to a career than telling an unfortunate truth.” Ray Moore was a very good South African tennis player and is a very nice guy. He once partnered me to a final in a major tournament and we have stayed friends for forty years and more. The man who owns the Indian Wells tournament, multi-billionaire Larry Ellison, is a … Continue reading →

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On November 17, 1813, the bravest of the brave, Marshal Ney, had been the last to march out of Smolensk amid harrowing scenes. The hospital wards, the corridors, and the stairs were full of the dead and dying. Napoleon had gone into Russia the year before with 500,000 men and was now leaving with less than 40,000. Ney had only 6,000 under his command but was determined not to fall into Russian hands. The Russian commander Miloradovich had already failed to capture Prince Eugene, Napo’s son-in-law, and the great Davout, so he set his heart on capturing the 43-year-old son … Continue reading →

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Athens—I am walking around downtown Athens watching thousands of migrants fielding pitches from smugglers for alternative routes to Germany and Austria. I ask a friendly policeman fifty years younger than me why he doesn’t arrest the smugglers and throw the key away. “Others will take their place quicker than we put the handcuffs on them,” he tells me. “And they pretend to be migrants the moment we approach.” Smuggling people is big business, and most of the bad guys are Afghans, as far as I can tell while mixing among them. It is grim stuff, especially where children are concerned. … Continue reading →

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One reason I do not tweet, text, or use Facebook or Instagram, and only wield a mobile when a landline is unavailable, is because all of the above gadgets are free of anything resembling a credible spoken word emanating from a disease-free brain. The mind-numbing gobbledygook that billions send back and forth constitutes a sort of 10th circle of Dante’s Inferno, oxygen-deprived brains with their imaginations up their backsides, strung out on their own solipsism, benighted, boring, and brain-jolting in their braggadocio. Whew, I finally got that off my chest. When I founded The American Conservative in 2002, and after … Continue reading →

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Gstaad—I had the rather subversive idea of offering a six-figure sum to Oriel College, Oxford. On one condition: that the college immediately terminate the Rhodes scholarship for the South African Ntokozo Qwabe, the hypocrite who led the campaign to remove the statue of Cecil Rhodes, as well as any other recipients of Cecil’s munificence who are blackening his name a century later. It is the least these hypocrites deserve. Oxbridge has become a joke by trying to emulate the LSE in radicalism and other such ludicrous poses. The group that called Jihadi John a beautiful young man should be allowed … Continue reading →

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Gstaad—The Dolly Sisters were off to Davos last week for the World Economic Forum: Nat Rothschild and Sebastian Taylor in their finest, playing up to Harry Selfridge, in reality Christine Lagarde, the IMF chief under indictment. The purpose of a week’s total waste of time is advertised as a discussion of the global issues of the day. In reality it’s utter twaddle, unless one is networking like the Dolly Sisters, or showing off like Justin Trudeau, the Canadian premier whose mother is Margaret, once upon a time a Studio 54 regular and a friend of yours truly. Old Greek ship-owning … Continue reading →

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The death of David Bowie—why is it that Stephen Glover always gets it right about our overreaction and hysteria when a pop star goes the way of all of us?—twigged something that happened long ago, with Iman, his still-beautiful widow. It was exactly thirty years ago, on a rainy and cold night in New York. But first, a brief background to the story. In the winter of 1985 the mother of my children had taken them to Paris, to her mother’s, as a warning to me that my constant womanizing would no longer be tolerated. At the same time, an … Continue reading →

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Have we ever needed Christianity more than today? It’s a rhetorical question, for sure, because the loss of our faith and the inability to confront Islam have never been greater. When I was a little boy during the war, my mother assured me that if I believed in Jesus everything would be okay. This was during the bombing by the Allies on Tatoi, the military airfield where the Germans concentrated their antiaircraft guns near our country house. My fräulein, the Prussian lady who brought me up, was more practical. She handed me a beautiful carved knife that made me feel … Continue reading →

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Things turn very frivolous around this time of year. Barf-inducing parties by pop culture schlock merchants selling their wares are a nightly transgression, the hacks duly reporting the shenanigans of doped-up rappers the next day as once upon a time they detailed the haut monde. London isn’t much better. Last week, at the British Fashion Awards, a designer by the name of Jonathan Anderson said that he was “honored to be on the same stage as Karl Lagerfeld,” a bum-clenching announcement for its unremitting vapidity. Lagerfeld is a preening, self-important freak whose trademark is rudeness and that other giveaway of … Continue reading →

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Those who forget the pasta are condemned to reheat it, said Jon Ronson, a man I’d never heard of until his quip about spaghetti. I read this somewhere, as I’ve never used social media—Twitter, Facebook, Instagram—and hope never to. Why would I, unless I wanted to make trouble for myself? Not everyone needs to know what you’re doing all of the time. Or anytime, for that matter. They say the most destructive four-letter word in social media is “send.” (Just as the scariest three words in American literature are “Joyce Carol Oates.”) I recently received an e-mail from a young … Continue reading →

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Blind is an indie movie with an original screenplay by John Buffalo Mailer and directed by his older brother Michael Mailer. It stars Alec Baldwin and Demi Moore, and the cast includes yours truly. Personal feelings aside, and from all reports and rushes, this is going to be a really good one. Alec Baldwin is an old pro at this game, and his advice has been immeasurable and very much appreciated. I’ve never seen a more contented cast, with a brilliant Polish cinematographer whose sensitivity shines through the drama. Obviously I will not give the game away, but it’s a … Continue reading →

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To Cleveland, Ohio, where mid-America’s middle class begins its great Midwest sprawl. I always wanted to visit Cleveland because the so-called sophisticates have poked fun at it. And the place does not disappoint. Beautiful municipal buildings of Fascist Roman style line the shores of Lake Erie, public libraries, city halls, opera houses, large public spaces, you get my drift. The people are friendly, unlike the aggressive slobs who pass for Noo Yawkers nowadays. The purpose of the visit is to moderate a debate and visit with Chronicles magazine staff and rub elbows with Chronicles readers, who have shown up in … Continue reading →

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Gstaad—Jeremy Clarke has wiped me out again, for a change. His accounts of the high jinks on board the Spectator cruise had the mother of my children laughing out loud, something she’s not known for among those of us who consider laughing loudly a staggering breach of taste. Never mind, Jeremy’s talents and abilities to describe indescribable situations in prose that makes the reader feel on hand is a badly kept secret among those of us who love good writing. The only thing wrong with Jeremy is that he shows me up week in, week out. And mind you, being … Continue reading →

Gstaad—it was the summer of 1953, in Greece. We spent two months together, had a platonic love affair, and then she got married and died soon after. She was older than me, but not by much, and I had turned sixteen that summer. Her name was Maria Agapitou, and she was a rare beauty, at least in my inexperienced eyes. An inner voice tells me to beware of nostalgia—after all, I last saw her 62 years ago—but at my age the past is richer than the future, so here goes. We met in a park at a northern resort in … Continue reading →