The public is undoubtedly under the impression, deliberately created by Ministers Of the Crown led by the Prime Minister, that as a result Of recent legislation it is against...

There is this to be said for the disastrous events in Ulster which began in the early hours of Wednesday this week and continued throughout the day and night, that Britain has...

Law and disorder Patrick Cosgrave In the somewhat subdued debate that has been proceeding, sedately, about the reform of criminal law in Britain too little attention has been...

Jane Fonda, Dr Spock and peace Al Capp The Peace Mafia here was more enraged by the peace than they ever were by the war. (The Peace Mafia must not be confused with those of us...

One more sonic boom? Oliver Stewart Concorde commentators, shouting their heads off either in welcome or in derision of the Pan Am and TWA decisions, have failed utterly to...

Good brother Calif orniensis Mercurius Oxoniensis Good brother Californiensis, You reproach me for my long silence, which indeed is blameable, but I shall extenuate my fault...

PUZZLE WOULD LIKE to enier a progress report on Jim Prior as Leader of the House of Commons. A fly mover, Jim. He made sympathetic noises about Willie Hamilton's failed Bill on...

The United States has just succeeded in terminating — so far as itself is concerned — the most humiliating war not merely in its own history but in that of most Western nations...

Auberon Waugh Birchwood John Banville (Secker and Warburg £2). The Famished Land Elizabeth Byrd (Macmillan £2.95). Two novels within a month about the Irish potato famine...

Alastair Buchan Memoirs 1950-1963 George F. Kerman (Hutchinson £4.50) George Kennan is one of the most appealing figures of the whole generation that was in the prime of life...

Norman Stone The Russian Revolution of February 1917 Marc Ferro, translated by J. L. Richards (Routledge and Kegan Paul £4.95). 1905 L. Trotsky, translated Anya Bostock (Allen...

John Vaizey Nine Chains to the Moon R. Buckminster Fuller (Cape £3.95) Education Automation R. Buckminster Fuller (Cape £1.95) Once a year, in the spring, the University of...

Bookbuyer In the light of Bookbuyer's remarks recently about the pros and cons of ' vanity publishing' — the Regency Press and the like — he is pleased to receive a letter...

A spacious country house in Sweden at the turn of the century. It is four o'clock in the morn:ng. As clocks tick in the gloomy red rooms, Agnes wakes up and listens. Suddenly...

Doubtful channel Clive Gammon The most original suggestion I have yet heard for the disposal of the disputed Fourth Channel came from a man in the studio audience of Granada's...

Yesterdays' men Evan Anthony Oh, the folly of acts perpetrated in the name of scholarship! And specifically of the latest example, the Futurismo 1909-1919 exhibition now on...

New theatres for old is a proposition with attractions as illusory as Abanazer's deal with the lamps. The catch is that the new ones are so costly to build that the rentals go...

Francis Win tie Population has been politics for a long time. In some sense it Probably always has been; but such emotive phrases as the 'Population explosion" or the...

Fact and fantasy John Rowan Wilson An eminent psychiatrist recently pointed out that, in spite of the vast amount of time and money spent on psychotherapy, there is really no...

Benny Green The advance of the Jewish Mother in the last twenty years as a saleable property in popular entertainment, continues to surprise those people like myself who,...

Hill-top history Peter Quince Fog, frost, followed by hazy sunshine. The weather forecasters have been having an easy time as I write, with one day after another conforming to...

Nicholas Davenport The Budget is a month away and already people are saying that Mr Barber is preparing to hand out another £300 million or so. When will the largesse stop?...

some of the points raised in the letter Mrs Brock wrote to you (Letters, February 3) in response to mine concerning the National Trust? Mrs Brock notes that I did not query the...

of standards. In my submission, aesthetic and commercial interests will usually be found to coincide, and Montacute is a case in point. An 'entrance shop ', besides spoiling the...

Sir: It is little less than fraudulent of Miss Holm (Letters, February 3) to justify the tasteless trendiness ' of New Life on the grounds that the social relevance which it...

Christian religion can, it is apparent, no longer agree how religious education should be carried out; but they remain determined that their beliefs shall continue to be taught...

Sir: Mr Douglas Dunn's honest and sympathetic concern for the revaluation of Pound is not helped by his falling for the usual redherrings — or anti-red herrings. What is to be...

Sir: I was saddened by the article by my erstwhile colleague Reg Bevins (February 3) whom I used to regard as a level-headed man with both feet firmly planted on the ground....

write to express their sense of outrage that you should have seen fit to print the column contributed by J. R. Bevins (February 3). Clearly you have no high regard for the...

The prospect of Captain Ryan Price securing his fifth Schweppes . Gold Trophy has been exercising the pens of the press — and the pockets of the public — for the past month or...

Sir: I have read Robert Moss's review (January 27) of David Caute's book: The Fellow Travellers. And, of course, as I have not read the work I cannot comment on it. On the other...

From Commander Edgar P. Young Sir: Robert Moss is unduly kind, I think, in his review of David Caute's book The Fellow Travellers (January 27). For the author, who professes to...

Sir: Anyone who's interested in the question of academic degeneration raised by David Holbrook's 'Nihilistic barbarism' (January 13) need look no further than your...

Sir: It's a pretty cup-of-tea when one is forced to admit that somebody's pair-of-shoes is not one's kettle-of-fish. But life is comprised of such chimeras, or reasonably...

castigation of the Prime Minister's misuse of " flaunt " for "flout" (Letters, February 3). for she surely cannot be allowed to get away with asking defenders of the English...

From Mrs Margaret Thompson Sir: In Christopher Booker's Christmas Quiz, question 2, may point out that Martin and Gilbert Ryle are not brothers — they are nephew an uncle, I...