After 11 years, Harry Eyres’ column has come to an end. Here’s his first, from January 17, 2004

Through this column, connections have been made and the conversation has broadened

Isis could be seen as a vast and terrifying collective outbreak of the Freudian concept of ‘acting out’

It is that forging and tempering that makes the poet’s utterances strong and flexible

The quiet streets have that special Viennese quality of grandeur combined with melancholy and nostalgia

Perhaps a lot of rugby has always been prosaic but I struggle to recall such a dearth of poetry

Participation in the arts has a hugely positive impact on people’s health and wellbeing

Caricaturist James Gillray was arrested over a print showing politicians kissing a new royal baby’s backside

A country’s values come into focus when seen by an outsider, contrasting them with his native country

As I approached the hall where the relics of our vintage were assembled, I heard an unspirit-like roar

Taipei’s MRT is the only underground railway where someone has offered to tie up my shoelace

The story of Sisyphus compares quite well with the experience of zero-hours contracts

The extraordinary thing about Roger Federer is that he still loves playing tennis after all these years

Feelings of shame, unlike other emotions, are difficult to hide

‘There is a unique beauty to this time of year. Everything looks ghostly in the dense, opaque air’

Have we gone from protecting nature to managing it on behalf of the Earth’s dominant species?

Mussorgsky and Toulouse-Lautrec reached out to people treated as extras rather than full human subjects

Too many poets have turned inward, speaking to their fellows rather than to the wider world

This is about reminding ourselves that we are animals, not adjuncts to computer terminals

There are profound reasons for studying the languages, literature and civilisations of the Greeks and Romans

Three recent decisions have brought this issue into focus – and all three are lamentable and incoherent

Victor Erice is one of those rare film directors who show time passing apparently at its own pace

Paris is organised around culture to a degree unimaginable in mercantile, muddled-up London

Kew may be 70 times bigger than the Physic Garden, but historically Chelsea is the mother ship