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The Times journalist Rachel Sylvester joins the Prospect Interview to get us up to date about the state of Brexit talks, and introduce the man behind Britain’s negotiating table, David Frost. Is a hard Brexit inevitable, and what can Frost’s little-known background reveal about where Britain stands with the EU?

You can read Rachel’s profile of David Frost here: https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/profile-who-is-david-frost-brexit-negotiator-cliff-edge

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Writer and broadcaster Eliane Glaser joins the Prospect Interview to make a defense of what she deems “progressive elitism.” In the era of populism, the trust in institutions and experts has plummeted within the left and right alike. Eliane makes the case for excellence in these divided times—and tells us why restoring standards may in fact restore popular democracy. 

Elitism: A Progressive Defense is published by Biteback 

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Avni Doshi’s Booker Prize-shortlisted debut novel, Burnt Sugar, follows an artist in Pune, India, whose mother suddenly gets diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. The revelation unravels difficult family histories, uncovering the secrets binding mother and daughter. Avni joins the Prospect Interview to discuss writing the novel—and why it took seven years—and what it’s been like living through the Booker Prize media blitz. 

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In 1990, when he was just nine years old, Prospect’s Sameer Rahim joined his parents and sister on a holiday to Iraq. What was first a family trip quickly turned into an international diplomatic fiasco. As Saddam Hussein was then facing international condemnation for the Kuwait War, Sameer and his family were taken as so-called “human-shield hostages”: Britons kept within Iraq as bargaining chips. In a personal essay for the current issue of Prospect, Sameer remembers his time cooped up in a Baghdad hotel—and reflects on what the experience has taught him about the many sides of national identity.

You can read Sameer’s essay, I was Saddam’s prisoner, here: https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/i-was-saddams-prisoner

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They’ve taken over our cinemas screens (when cinemas were still open)—but where did the superheroes who now dominate our screens come from? Writer and Spectator literary editor Sam Leith joins the Prospect Interview to discuss the history of Marvel Comics and its legendary creative leader, Stan Lee. Lee’s creations—which include Spider-Man, the Incredible Hulk, and the Black Panther—aren’t just crime-fighting men in tights, Leith says. They also speak to the social concerns of Lee’s time, and have made a remarkable American pantheon.  

You can read Sam’s essay on Stan Lee and the Marvel Comics universe here: https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/stan-lee-marvel-dc-comic-books-american-pantheon

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