Read our interview with the talented Mr Key, find out why AI is a con, and learn how to spot the everyday narcissist – plus loads more. Tom Hodgkinson with a few of the highlights of our new issue

Our new issue was released on Thursday. The cover star is Tim Key and the pics were done by the great Chris Floyd. I met Tim soon after seeing his new film, The Ballad of Wallis Island, which is superb. We had a convivial chat about the creative life and I could sum up Tim’s advice to artists, actors and other job-avoiders in three words: “Just … keep … going!”

Is there a narcissist in your life? If so you’ll enjoy Harry Mount’s portrait of this tricky personality type. It’s the kind of person who, when you tell them, “I’ve just seen the most fantastic film!” replies, “no one ever takes me to the cinema.”

AI is everywhere. Tech companies are falling over each other to demonstrate to the world that they are ahead in the AI race. Google has added an annoying “AI Overview” to searches. This is virtually impossible to turn off. But do you know what AI really, actually, is? According to artist and academic Wesley Goatley, the term is meaningless, or at least covers a very wide range of technologies, and is really a marketing trick. If people believe that you are on the edge of creating a machine with superhuman-intelligence, he argues, which will solve climate change and cure cancer, then your coffers will swell. AI, he says, is the latest example of capitalism selling back “ineffective cures to its own diseases”.

And on a more positive note, Stephen Bayley, the noted style guru, writes in praise of that middle class temple, Waitrose. Even their bags, he says, shout good taste: “A Tesco bag is mean, crisp and cheap, an ugly thing which only ever lives again as a makeshift bin liner… A Waitrose carrier bag, by contrast, is a fine, durable product with a gentlemanly texture. It speaks of expensive picnics, and easily out-snobs Harrods in prestige.”

PLUS Art Flâneur goes underground, Mik Artistik strikes curious poses, Georgia Mann writes on the composers who retreated to remote spots in order to work, Mark Vernon reveals the most feared and satanic technology of the Middle Ages – the windmill, Guy Hayward takes us on a pilgrimage to the old churches, woodland shrines and stone circles of North Wales, Victoria Hull visits a Sicilian café in west London, Joseph Piercy samples “Dutch gin” in Bruges and Lindsey Bareham teaches us the art of the polpette.

Subscribers, you may read the issue online here.

Have a happy summer,
Tom

PS I’m taking a break from the newsletter over August. The next one will go out on 4 September

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Our August/September 2025 issue is available in Waitrose, Waterstones, Smiths Travel outlets, select Smiths high street branches and around 100 indie stores. Click here for your nearest stockist.