The Joy of Six 1145

"The self-styled free market task force seems to be yet another dark money outfit in British politics – led by senior figures from US and UK free market think tanks who have been funded by fossil fuels, the Koch Brothers, climate change deniers, the tobacco industry and much more." Peter Geoghegan looks behind the scenes of Liz Truss's new 'growth commission'.

Anny Shaw and Hannah McGivern find that funding cuts and a weak economy have sent Britain’s visual arts into crisis.

"For six decades, To Kill a Mockingbird has been taught with the comfort (and power) of white students (and their mostly white teachers) in mind. Ensuring this comfort has led millions to an absurd reading of a seminal work of literature." Andrew Simmons on teaching America's 'national novel'.

"While his florid, stentorian contributions to Dadaist 60s trad-jazz mutilators the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band influenced everyone from the Beatles to Monty Python, a peripatetic path through the 70s saw him appear as the Master of Ceremonies on Mike Oldfield’s Tubular Bells and as a regular lyricist for Steve Winwood, before his 1978 solo LP, the grandiloquent, gothic spoken-word masterpiece Sir Henry at Rawlinson End." Andrew Male has helped rescue Viv Stanshall's unfinished work.

Alex Grant says Northampton needs to grow up and become a city. On a personal note, it took me some years of exploration to realise what a historic place it is.

Rose Staveley-Wadham on baseball's fascinating history in Britain. By 1938 the game had taken such a hold that the British team beat the American one at the inaugural Amateur World Series tournament.