The Week Magazine

Review: James Clarke

Vote now: (5 stars = masterpiece)

Number of votes: 23 | average rating: 2

I’ve heard it said that if you want to know what the average man on the street is thinking then read the Sun Newspaper. I don’t subscribe to this at all. What a depressing idea.

I also don’t like the thought of getting my news from a sole source especially considering the biased views of some of the agenda driven British press.

However if want a broad summary of what is bring said in the media and if, like me, you don’t have time or the inclination to buy and read a paper everyday then I would strongly recommend The Week. It drops through my post box every Friday and is billed as a unique digest of British and World news with reviews of current affairs, politics, business, culture and sport.

The 40+ page magazine first splits a couple of major stories by ‘What happened’, ‘What the editorials said’, ‘What the commentators said’, and ‘What next?’. It then has a few lighter, smaller snippets in a section called ‘It wasn’t all bad’ - the equivalent of the kitten being rescued from the tree TV report.

Following UK focussed items like ‘Controversy of the week’ and ‘Boring but important’ it then summarises stories from around the world first displayed around a map of Europe and then the rest of the globe. This moves seamlessly into brilliant, short reports on items like ‘Statistics of the week’ and ‘Spirit of the age’ which focuses on political correctness that would infuriate even the most casual Daily Mail reader. For example this week reports that Birmingham City Council is to remove apostrophise from street signs simply to achieve consistency.

I love the section ‘It must be true… I read it in the tabloids’ which picks out some of the bizarre and shocking stories that week like the NHS having to perform an exorcism on a ward after worker complained of ghost stalking the wards. Some of my other favourites include ‘Pick of the week’s correspondence’ which covers letters to various British newspapers and Review of Reviews covering what was said about everything from film, books and art.

It’s about £2.50 per week and is has obviously grown in the few years I’ve been subscribing as I’ve spotted American and Australian versions on my travels.

TheWeekMagazine on Twitter

Check it out