Blind passion
Michael White enjoys Stephen Pollard's honest look at the beleaguered home secretary, David Blunkett.
Mutant study wins Guardian book prize
Armand Marie Leroi's study of the curious and touching forms into which the human body is sometimes cast, which argues, "there are no monsters", won the £10,000 Guardian First Book award last night.
Pupils face penalties for bad grammar
The head of the government's exam watchdog today indicated he was considering reforms that would see pupils lose marks for poor grammar in a bid to improve literacy.
Breaking the Da Vinci code
Is there anything fresh to be written about Leonardo da Vinci? Lisa Jardine assesses biographies by Charles Nicholl and Martin Kemp.
Biographer takes shine off Spielberg’s Schindler
According to history professor David Crowe's new biography of the German industrialist, Schindler's list, the legendary document containing names of Jewish employees at his Polish factory who were designated as "essential workers" and thus spared from the concentration camps, did not exist.
Mother’s the word
Think about the word mother: does it make you burst into a fantastic smile? If your answer is yes, you will have embraced your mum and the word that came top in a survey of the UK's favourite words conducted by the British Council.
Vincent Brome
Obituary: Life and soul of the British Library reading room.
80 million pieces of paper, two million photos, 79,000 objects – and not a blue dress in sight
Let's get this out of the way: there is no sign of Monica Lewinsky's blue dress in Bill Clinton's personal monument to his immortality, a cantilevered span of steel and glass that seems to float above the Arkansas river and which will house the physical remains of his presidency.
Terence Moore
Obituary: Philosophy editor with a list built on understanding and warmth.