Six of the Best 418

Thinking Liberal discusses the remarkable political success of Michael Gove: "Another good thing, though largely unremarked, is that Mr Gove’s Academy programme is putting private schools under real pressure. Many private schools outside the South East are now signing up to be state schools, run as academies."

"A tweet and an innocuous cartoon have exposed a battle that has been waging in Britain Muslim communities for the past six years and is set to continue for many more." Harry's Place gives its take on Maajid Nawaz's recent difficulties.

Racial inequality is  a key factor in structural youth unemployment for some ethnic minorities says John Philpott.

Alex Thomson writes on the floods and the Severn bore for Channel 4 News.

"The scholarly craft of gathering scattered sources and weaving them into a coherent whole is transformed here into something beautiful and unsettling, elevated into an art of the uncanny—an art that was, in the end, Sebald’s strange and inscrutable gift." Mark O'Connell reviews a collection of essays by W.G. Sebald for Slate.

Unmitigated England visits a ridge above Little Brington.