`You've been washing again, you naughty boy!' I n the political slack season there were persistent rumours of diplomatic contacts between Britain and the new Argentine...

The Spectator, 56 Doughty Street, London WC1N 2LL Telephone 01-405 1706; Telex 27124; Fax 242 0603 TAKING A BATH L ast week's announcement of the method of privatising the ten...

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An invitation to Mr Hattersley to cast modesty aside NOEL MALCOLM I t would be an exaggeration, perhaps even a contradiction in terms, to say that the issue of proportional...

N o invitations to shoot grouse this Saturday have come my way. Reports from the Pennine moors, however, indicate that shooting will be severely curtailed this year, and some...

Something for the boobies now that socialism has failed AUBERON WAUGH R ichard Davy, writing in last Friday's Independent, asked what strikes me as one of the most profound...

James Bowman argues that the new environmentalism bear a disturbing family resemblance to a tyranny from which we were only just escaping For you only have to talk to a...

Stephen Robinson on the low ebb of the ANC, now facing prospects of talks with the government THERE is a remarkable sense of deja vu about the current strategies and antics of...

Karan Thapar on the woman Karan Thapar on the woman who is in prison for leading the movement for change ONCE again a military government in Asia IS scared of a young woman...

Michael Heath

Dominic Lawson on the effect of a takeover on his corner shop TAKEOVERS were always such fun. When I was a columnist on the Financial Times, there was nothing I enjoyed more...

Kevin Pilley joins a circle of omnibologists in full session ST PANCRAS Church Hall, opposite the Eversholt Street entrance in Euston sta- tion, is not a particularly...

how the Rushdie affair has put Labour on the rack THE Labour Party, I suspect, will come to shudder at the very mention of Salman Rushdie. The affair is already becoming a...

SAY what you like, if anything, about Sir James Goldsmith, but he knows how to put on a turn. If he needs to raise more money to bid for BAT, he can, as Stephen Fay suggests,...

I WAS glad to find the World Bank sending its material, this week, to my great predecessor Nicholas Davenport. We are getting on for Nicholas's centenary. A professed believer...

How the team at Gunge Television plans to reward its public service CHRISTOPHER FILDES T he ingenious goings-on at London Weekend Television, where the board and Its senior...

EVEN in Liverpool, the penny has drop- ped, so that is the end of the dock strike. What is far more, it is the end of the dock strikes, as we have known them for so long and so...

Sir: The word `naff (Diary, 22 July) has gained its popularity in these anti-elitist times precisely because its meaning has to do with style and taste rather than class (it is...

suggest that the word naff is an abbreviation of the word `non-affiance' (n.aft). Etymologically 'affiance' comes from the late Latin noun ad fidantia, then through the Old...

word `naff is none other than Lord Blake, Provost of the Queen's College in Oxford. I remember that in 1977 his membership of the Nation- al Association for Freedom was exciting...

Sir: Regarding rude restaurateurs, Josephine Quintavalle (Letters, 5 August) at least had the consolation of being ejected by Mr Pierre White unbilled. Last Saturday a group of...

Sir: Seeking 'triumphant vindication' of `the "common notion" of William Word- sworth', which I understand to be that he wrote good poetry when it put forth revolutionary views...

Sir: Diana Geddes is sweeping in her assumptions (`Taking liberties', July 15). One, she says signatories to Charter 88 complain. Two, she suggests that France is the only...

ALTERNATIVE. Crass, mediocre, un- shaven. Nigel Burke

Lost behind the mask Bevis Hillier OSBERT: PORTRAIT OF OSBERT LANCASTER by Richard Boston Collins, £17.50, pp.256 T he cliché thing to say about Osbert Lancaster was that he...

The whinstone sheepfold's been submerged by spruce, Now they've put Kirkhouse Moor to commercial use. In thirty years, they'll pick up a return On their plantatiRn leagues by...

John Michell CIRCULAR EVIDENCE by Pat Delgado and Colin Andrews Bloomsbury, f14.95, pp.192 THE CIRCLES EFFECT AND ITS MYSTERIES by George T. Meaden Artetech Publishing,...

Richard Shone CONGENIAL SPIRITS: THE SELECTED LETTERS OF VIRGINIA WOOLF edited by Joanne Troutmann Banks Hogarth, f18.50, pp.400 D earest Nessa, God knows it's a torture to...

Mark Archer FRANCES BURNEY: THE LIFE IN THE WORK by Margaret Ann Doody CUP, £30, pp.441 F arewell Fannekin. Ever since Saints- bury wrote The Peace of the Augustans,...

Liliana Brisby BUDAPEST 1900 by John Lukacs Weidenfeld & Nicolson, £16.95, pp.255 ei■_ I n 1907 a group of British members of the House of Commons known for their...

Max Egremont VERONICA OR THE TWO NATIONS by David Caute Hamish Hamilton, £12.95, pp.316 T he political novel is apt to go wrong either because it preaches too stridently or...

. . or almost £30 on The Spectator If you're forced to share The Spectator with fellow students, then you'll know how difficult it can be to track a copy down. Now you can save...

Museums The trials of Count Schouvaloff Nicky Bird A lexander Schouvaloff was, until last week, the patrician and distinguished Curator of the Theatre Museum in Covent...

Posada: Messenger of Mortality (Camden Arts Centre, till 3 September, then touring) Day of the Dead John Henshall I t is rare to find an artist whose output seems to...

A kingdom without a ruler Zelig Michaels `Herbert von Karajan is no more,' intoned Kurt Waldheim when he opened this summer's Salzburg Festival soon after the death of the...

(Londres. Par Jules Degregny. Paris: Lib- rairie Moderne, 7 Rue St. Benoit.) UNDER the growing habit which travellers of one nation are developing of writing books about...

British Impressionism (Phillips till 31 August) 56 Group Wales (Swiss Cottage Library till 23 September) Dry season Giles Auty M ost days of the year, the heavy thud of my...

Running on Empty `15' Selected cinemas Uncommon criminals Hilary Mantel T he Pope family resemble, on the sur- face, 'a little Norman Rockwell family'. They live in a small...

Not even the chair Marcus Berkmann S o far, 1989 has not been the best of years for records by those we like to think of as 'major' artists. Time and again, heavily touted new...

Sunned off Peter Phillips dos to the effect that cricketers aren't what they used to be. Instead, I would contend that the gener- al level of fitness amongst county players...

Edin- burgh at festival time and Giles Auty on exhibitions.

Mixed up in politics Taki Gstaad The Eagle Club is shut during the summer, and a good thing too, as many of the members are not exactly presentable in shorts and shirtsleeves....

Soul food Peter Levi T here are days when television is a balm. It runs like ointment down the beard of Aaron, even unto the hem of his garment. The machine is quite...

She will continue to write for The Spectator from time to time, returning to the paper in the autumn. A new column at the back of the magazine will be appearing shortly.

Snakes and ladders Jeffrey Bernard antas got me out of bed at 5 a.m. yesterday to go to Heathrow to meet my daughter who was arriving from Sydney potless, baggageless and...

This is the first in a series of lithographs by Alan Powers showing the Welsh borders, accompanied by sonnets from a series by Peter Levi. LIKE the Lake District, the borders...

Always fresh and optimistic Auberon Waugh he Great Heat of July caught me with a cellarful of chardonnays from the four corners of the earth but no sauvignons to speak of....

Spectator Wine Club, Cio Avery's of Bristol, 7 Park Street, Bristol BS1 5NG Tel: Bristol (0272) 214141 Code No, White Price No. Value 9725789F Ch. Pichon Bellevue, Graves...

Mnemonic Jaspistos I n Competition No. 1586 you were asked for mnemonic verses to help remember the sequence of the last eight US presidents. Only three of them (Ford,...

Jules et Jim Raymond Keene A fter eight rounds, with three more to play, the British Championship is boiling up to a close finish. As I write, five players share the lead with...

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The silly season in the press is with us again, witness some of last week's head- lines, such as 'Man Bites Dog' and 'World War 2 Bomber Found on Moon'. You are invited to...