The Oldie

The idea for the Oldie was cooked up 25 years ago by its founding editor, Richard Ingrams, and his much-lamented successor, the late Alexander Chancellor. Their aim was to create a free-thinking, funny magazine, a light-hearted alternative to a press obsessed with youth and celebrity. The Oldie is ageless and timeless, free of retirement advice, crammed with rejuvenating wit, intelligence and delight. With over 100 pages in every issue, The Oldie is packed with funny cartoons and free-thinking and intelligent articles covering a wide range of topics – from gardening and books to travel, arts, entertainment, and so much more.

The Oldie

The Old Un's Notes

Among this month's contributors

NOT MANY DEAD • Important stories you may have missed

There is nothing like Dame Judi • Happy 90th birthday to our greatest living actress

Welcome to the DIY NHS • If Wes Streeting has his way, we'll soon be performing surgery on ourselves

OLDEN LIFE

MODERN LIFE

Fairest of them all • Who was the prettiest of Henry VIII's six wives? Their biographer, Lady Antonia Fraser, has the answer

Skinhead hunter • John Ingledew remembers photographing shaven-headed trendsetters in the early eighties

Attack of the thriller bees • When thousands of bees invaded his garden, John Humphrys was terrified – but then he learned to love them

Warning! Bore alert • Ever found yourself bored to death at dinner? Nick Peto has learnt from bitter experience how not to be dull

The Avon lady on Suez • Clarissa Avon, Anthony Eden's wife, was the last great witness to the Suez Crisis.

Take that! • Got an enemy (or friend) you want to insult? Look no further. A new book has all the best – and rudest – quips

Steamy Puccini • A century after his death, Rev Peter Mullen salutes the maestro's heartbreaking arias – and his tumultuous love life

A poet's best career move? Die young • Imagine the sadness of Keats and Shelley as pot-bellied Victorians

Harper Lee's reading lesson

Audrey Hepburn

A bohemian banker in Soho

How U are you? • Clothes remain class giveaways, 70 years after Nancy Mitford's essay

Closing time for overpriced pubs

Requiem for my atheist mother

Churchill's painted lady • Lady Lavery taught Winston to paint – and starred on the Irish £100 note.

Don't carry on, nurse! • The surgeon had just started probing when he realised I was the wrong patient

Commonplace Corner

RANT

Too late to say goodbye • When Richard Britton‘s wife died suddenly, he didn't have time to tell her he loved her

The bloody truth of country life

Inside job • A tantalising view of the lost interiors of London's greatest houses

My Orcadian Arcadia

Julia Rausing (1961-2024)

Pros and cons of prostate treatment • Many more men die with prostate cancer rather than of it

READERS’ LETTERS • The Oldie, 23-31 Great Titchfield Street, London, W1W 7PA letters@theoldie.co.uk To sign up for our e-newsletter, go to www.theoldie.co.uk

Bennett's swansong?

Kings of the forest

Top trainspotter

An American tragedy

Tipping Point II

Sea changes

Bertie Wooster of No 10

FILM • SUPER/MAN: THE CHRISTOPHER REEVE STORY (12A)

THEATRE • DR STRANGELOVE

RADIO

TELEVISION

MUSIC • GABRIEL FAURÉ

GOLDEN OLDIES • RIP AUTOGRAPHS

EXHIBITIONS • LEIGHTON AND LANDSCAPE

GARDENING • JOY OF HOUSE PLANTS

KITCHEN GARDEN • MACE

COOKERY • STIR-UP SUNDAY

RESTAURANTS • LUNCH ON THE PRODIGAL SON

DRINK • HOLIDAY...