MAGAZINE OF THE YEAR 23.01.21 The private side Meena Harris of Katie Price Love, ambition, My son Harvey politics – and and me growing up with Kamala AT HOME WITH THE CORENS Can life get any worse? OUR MODERN FAMILY Two dads, a baby and a surrogate By Paul Morgan-Bentley Eat! PIMP YOUR PUMPKIN! DONNA HAY’S DELICIOUS VEGETARIAN RECIPES 23.01.21 27 22 5 Caitlin Moran Harry Styles – what’s not to love? 7 Spinal column My husband is having a meltdown. 9 What I’ve learnt Anna Friel on her heartbreak during a pandemic. 10 How to lose friends and alienate people Shane Watson on the rules for distant socialising. 16 Cover story Meena Harris The niece of Kamala Harris on her new book and growing up in a feminist household with America’s new vice-president. 22 Two men and a baby Paul Morgan-Bentley reveals how he found a surrogate mother for his son, Solly. 27 Eat! Donna Hay’s delicious vegetarian recipes. 38 Can the City survive Brexit? Former banker Oliver Kamm on whether the golden days are over for the Square Mile. 42 Katie Price: me and my disabled son The former glamour model opens up about the reality of life with Harvey, now 18. 48 Shop! What to buy to update your look fast. 49 Men’s style Best hoodies, plus new biker gear. 51 Beauty Our beauty editor’s top six lockdown products. 52 At home with the Corens Giles and Esther are not amused. 58 Beta male: Robert Crampton Why I’m prowling the streets. FIVE WFH NOISE-CANCELLING HEADPHONES MARSHALL, £239.99 BEATS, £179 SAMSUNG, £99 BANG & OLUFSEN, £350 BOSE, £250 A stylish pair from the cult Foldable and with two listening Affordable but with rich The luxury option. Made For sound geeks. These have brand. Block ambient sound modes so you can unblock sound. Available in five cool with soft leather and come in 11 noise-cancelling levels and (marshallheadphones.com) external sound (currys.co.uk) shades (samsung.com) a chic bag (bang-olufsen.com) a built-in mic (johnlewis.com) MONIQUE RIVALLAND CHOSEN BY EDITOR NICOLA JEAL DEPUTY EDITOR LOUISE FRANCE ART DIRECTOR CHRIS HITCHCOCK ASSOCIATE EDITOR SIMON HILLS ASSISTANT EDITOR TONY TURNBULL FEATURES EDITOR MONIQUE RIVALLAND CHIEF SUB-EDITOR AMANDA LINFOOT DEPUTY ART DIRECTOR JO PLENT DEPUTY CHIEF SUB-EDITOR CHRIS RILEY PICTURE EDITOR ANNA BASSETT ACTING PICTURE EDITORS LUCY DALEY, EITHNE STAUNTON CONTRIBUTING EDITOR BRIDGET HARRISON EDITORIAL ASSISTANT GEORGINA ROBERTS COVER: SOPHIE ELGORT. THIS PAGE: THIS PAGE: SOPHIE ELGORT. COVER: MARK HARRISON CON POULOS, The Times Magazine 3 CAITLIN MORAN My hot crush on Harry Styles His embrace of all things feminine only makes him more desirable here do we not behove me to dwell on his attractiveness: invent new kinds I’ve reached an age where you stop fancying of men? And hot young pop stars and start exclaiming, “Oh, how? Over the I bet his mother is so proud of him,” instead. past ten years, the But it’s what Styles has decided to do with current feminist all his power and fame that’s so intriguing. W renaissance – the Last month, he appeared on the cover of femaissance, if Vogue, wearing a dress. This isn’t the first time you will – has Styles has worn “things that only women are served us up dozens of new kinds of women. supposed to wear” – he’s regularly popped up Body-positive, twerking Lizzo in her purple wearing pearl necklaces and see-through blouses leotard; the gleeful hustler-stoner Jewish girls – but it is certainly the most controversial. in Broad City; Michaela Coel’s dazzling, flawed Candace Owens, an American conservative turn in I May Destroy You; the moustache- author and activist, tweeted, “There is no wearing King Princess. Fleabag, Greta Thunberg, society that can survive without strong men… Villanelle, Cardi B, Beyoncé, Michelle Obama, In the west, the steady feminization of our Malala; every week, it seems, there’s a new men at the same time that Marxism is being kind of woman being minted. I can’t lie – as taught to our children is not a coincidence. It the mother of teenage daughters, it’s awesome. is an outright attack. Bring back manly men.” When I was their age, my female role models It certainly kicked off a heated debate came down to a) Margaret Thatcher, or b) about what “being a man” means now. This Courtney Love. Obviously, that’s a potent mix only intensified with the release of the video – but not one with, shall we say, much nuance. for his single Treat People with Kindness. It But men, on the other hand? Who do essentially casts him as Ginger Rogers, and 21st-century teenage boys have to look up to? Fleabag’s Phoebe Waller-Bridge as Fred Astaire: Alas, there’s not so much invention here. Pop it’s Waller-Bridge wearing the trousers, smoking culture still tends to offer us superheroes, a cigar and bending the similarly trousered gangsters, detectives, “good, normal blokes”, or Styles over her arm for a kiss at the end. neurotic man-boys. David Tennant’s turn in And Styles clearly believes in the “admiring Doctor Who – a hot, witty, genius pacifist – was female power” signals he’s giving off – his love 15 long years ago. Lil Nas X used Old Town life has not been an endless string of blonde Road to invent “glamorous gay cowboy”; and, models. Instead, his partners are invariably in Game of Thrones, Peter Dinklage’s dark, smart, older career women – his current sarcastic Tyrion was, essentially, a dwarf Martin girlfriend, the director Olivia Wilde, is 36. Amis stuck in a Dungeons & Dragons epic. Not since George Clooney married a leading But other than that? The range of heroes human rights lawyer has middle-aged, young men have to be inspired by is bizarrely working womankind felt so… valued. limited. Perhaps this explains the rise of men’s What’s fascinating about Styles’ gleeful Below: Harry Styles, 2019 rights activists and incels. What insecure man embracing of “feminine” things is that, wouldn’t be angered by, and jealous of, women? contrary to what many conservatives believe, Women these days get to do everything it has made him more powerful and desirable. – “woman stuff” like having emotions, nice A straight man After all, you have to have an astonishing dresses and babies; and “man stuff”, like amount of balls to give up every traditional having jobs, talking about sex and wearing appearing signifier of masculine power. trousers. Men feel a pressure to accrue and Harry Styles’ continuing popularity rests display power, money, physical strength, on the cover on him being an outlier: one of the first straight sexual attractiveness and “toughness”. If you men to realise that if women have found fail to have these things, the fear is that of Vogue power and freedom by taking masculine neither men nor women will respect you. things, then men can be equally empowered This is why the rise and rise of Harry wearing a by adopting feminine things. When Alexander Styles, right – former teen heart-throb of One the Great wept because he had no new worlds Direction turned singer-songwriter, model dress? That to conquer, if only he’d realised his next big and icon – is so heartening. Styles is, yes, rich challenge could have been “wearing a lovely – apparently worth £60 million – and sexually takes balls floral suit and talking to women”. Like this ROBERT WILSON, GETTY IMAGES WILSON, ROBERT attractive. As I am 45 and he is 26, it does new kind of man, Harry Styles. n The Times Magazine 5 Spinal column Melanie Reid ‘No pub, no gossip, no mates. And just when Dave thought it couldn’t get any worse…’ hen a man is “How about Sarah Beeny’s New deprived of Life in the Country? You like her.” everything he Shortly before I was about W holds dear – his to murder him, the aerial man friends, gossip, phoned. He’d been away. He’d wit, football, come, but his van wouldn’t start. political chat, draft beer and the Dave immediately drove down to familiar embrace of his local pub pick him up. “I’ve not got my – an awful void is left in his life. ladders,” the poor man protested. Anyone who suggests that that To no avail. He was hijacked. He same man should find a hobby arrived, masked, clutching tools. is on dangerous ground. What A decrepit booster was to do they expect him to take up? blame. Everything was fixed. Stamp collecting? Embroidery? Then, heart-sinkingly, last week My husband lives for company, it happened again. Blank screen. men’s company in particular. His “No aerial detected.” We went hobby is socialising. Apart from through the usual routine of anything else, it’s his respite and switching everything off and reward for caring for a disabled restarting. Nothing. wife. In the absence of anyone That night, I resolved to but me to talk to, and I’m usually stay cheerful. “How about a working, his substitute for the Scandi noir on Netflix?” I said. pub has been the TV. “Something we can both watch.” He is like a moth to a flame, My nemesis was this doomy glued to it for entertainment and message: “We’re having trouble escape. I totally understand that playing this title right now. Please sense of losing yourself in bright, try again later or select a different lively otherness, in the stories of title. Error code tvq-pb-101,” strangers.