Join me, Toby Young, on Wednesday the 18th of February for another installment in the Spectator's Speaker series.

I'll be joined by the star of Lord of the Rings and Indiana Jones, John Reese Davis.

We'll be covering his fascinating childhood in Tanzania, the secrets behind his lasting success,

and what he sees as the challenges facing Western civilization.

Join us in the library at Old Queen Street Cafe at 7pm on Wednesday the 18th of February.

Book your tickets at spectator.com forward slash book now. Hello and welcome to Spectator Out Loud, where each week we choose some of our favourite pieces from the magazine and ask their writers to read them aloud.

I'm Petra Gibbons and on this week's podcast, Tina Brown explains her bafflement

at how Jeff Bezos destroyed the Washington Post. Travis Arrow argues that while

Defence Minister Al Cairns may be admirable, Britain should resist military rule. Reviewing two

books on the eve of Valentine's Day, Justin Garcia's The Intimate Animal,

and Paul Eastericks Bonded by Evolution, Genevieve Gaunt ponders the survival of the fittest.

And finally, Deborah Ross declares herself a purist as she reviews the new film adaptation of Wuthering Heights.

Up first, Tina Brown.

The whole debacle of the Washington Post brand Haricari last week

dispatched the myth that a tech billionaire could save serious journalism.

Jeff Bezos's purchase of the paper in 2013 was greeted with euphoria,

not just because he was a big fat wallet who could absorb the losses,

but because we thought his Amazon wizardry was transferable to journalism's battered business model.

The man was a digital titan, for God's sake.

He started selling books online from his Bellevue Washington garage and built it into a $2.2 trillion consumer Nirvana with a

blue origin side hustle of suborbital rockets. Surely he would figure out innovative few ways to

connect the Washington Post's rigorous reporting with hungry new audiences. But last week's

...