Culture
Going soft
Millennials and Gen Z are falling hard for stuffed animals
Plushies are cute, cuddly and costly
Free speech in France
Ten years after the Charlie Hebdo massacre, satire is under siege
Public support is waning for the right to offend
Sympathy for the devil
Why do rebels and revolutionaries love “Paradise Lost”?
John Milton’s epic poem has galvanised rabble-rousers for centuries
Luces, cámara, acción!
The Colombian powerhouse behind some of streaming’s biggest hits
If you enjoyed “Narcos” or “One Hundred Years of Solitude”, you have Dynamo to thank
Strange and familiar places
What Haruki Murakami’s fans get wrong about him
He is not so much a surrealist as a dogged observer of solitude
Salt of the earth
The British take their crisps more seriously than any other nation
No other snack bridges the class divide in the same way
Festival of lights, stars and stripes
There is more to Hanukkah gifts than meets the eye
How American Jews reshaped an ancient, minor holiday
Back Story
“Babygirl” and the trouble with equality
In Nicole Kidman’s new film, a female CEO has an affair with an intern. Boo or bravo?
The Economist watches
The best Christmas films of all time
Turn off “Love Actually” and watch one of these titles instead
The Economist listens
The best music written about winter
Six compositions that capture the pleasures and perils of the coldest season
The snowball effect
Christmas films are cheesy, mindless and widely loved. Why?
The obviousness is part of the appeal
The future of humanity
Was Henry Kissinger an AI “doomer”?
A posthumous postscript on a hair-raising topic