`Farewell my lovely.' he Princess Royal, aged 42, suddenly announced her imminent marriage to Com- mander Timothy Laurence, aged 37. She had been divorced and was to marry in a...

Not the best possible advertisement for the summit of our achievements SIMON HEFFER I f the European Summit at Edinburgh this weekend reflects the British presidency that has...

NIGEL DEMPSTER T here are few people in British racing with any sympathy for the Aga Khan who is now contemplating whether to petition the Law Lords for leave to appeal after...

The real danger of the IRA is in expanding police powers AUBERON WAUGH I t seems more likely than not, even mak- ing every allowance for Irish incompetence and lack of nerve,...

Hugh Massingberd discusses the separation of the Prince and Princess of Wales and says now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of the monarchy THE CONCEPT of 'the...

David Shukman is given unofficial and unprecedented access to Russia's nuclear laboratory, and reveals its plans Moscow IN THE undistinguished sprawl of south- ern Moscow stands...

Michael Heath

Martin Vander Weyer reveals how Barclays is still under the influence of a 150-year-old squirearchy AT LORD'S, the fans of David Gower accuse England's cricket selectors of...

Nicholas Ridley argues that our arms traders must not be subject to 'armchair morality' JOHN SIMPSON'S article 'Backing the wrong horse' (28 November) is not only `economical...

persist.. . FOR THEM doctors as speaks proper, understanding what their patients say can be a problem. All British doctors are used to dealing with patients suffering from...

Julia Langdon reveals the workings of the political machine set up by William Cash, a man driven to destroy the Maastricht Bill SINCE THE European issue came to the top of the...

John Simpson on the unsung heroes who bring news and film from the world's most dangerous places ARTHUR PENLINGTON is not the kind of person you would immediately identify as a...

AN APOLOGY FROM AGE TO YOUTH WE ARE clear, at all events, that it is by no means the special defect of our time that the old do not enter heartily into the life of the young....

When your cold doesn't get better, that means there's something wrong with the doctor CHRISTOPHER FILDES R ecessions are like colds. Give them a chance and they cure...

Just for once, give the monarch an even break PAUL JOHNSON B ritain is in a state of acute desponden- cy, demoralisation and near despair, caused by the worst recession since...

Sir: Following the publication of Nicholas Farrell's article (Passive smoking: the big lie', 14 November), I look forward to a whole series of thought-provoking pieces from his...

Sir: If Lord Northcliffe dictated an editorial in the Daily Mail in 1931, (Politics, 5 December) it must have been via a medi- um. Lord Northcliffe died in 1922. The press lord...

Sir: Mr Derek Davies's rout of the Sino- wimps (Taal, fatal, fatal', 28 November) will doubtless stiffen still further the back- bone of that substantial majority of MPs Tory...

Sir: Couldn't the BBC tell its announcers how to pronounce 'schism'? On Newsnight recently the Archbishop of Canterbury pronounced it correctly three times as `sizm' (OED)....

Sir: Charles Moore displayed an unusually managerial approach to politics in express- ing the view (Another voice, 5 December) that a higher salary might attract better people...

Sir: John Simpson's excellent piece on 'The Irish Empire' (21 November) erred in describing the present Australian Prime Minister as the first of 'fully Irish extrac- tion'....

Jack the lad Alastair Forbes JFK: THE LIFE AND DEATH OF AN AMERICAN PRESIDENT; VOLUME I, RECKLESS YOUTH by Nigel Hamilton Century, £20, pp. 900 N owadays, when the famous...

Emma Tennant ORNAMENTAL SHRUBS, CLIMBERS AND BAMBOOS by Graham Stuart Thomas John Murray, f25, pp .544 G raham Stuart Thomas is one of thOse lucky people who discover their...

Raymond Carr HISTORIAN IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY by Max Beloff Yale, f18.95, pp. 144 W hen the governing body of Christ Church was debating the admission of women to the...

Mark Archer IRRATIONALITY: THE ENEMY WITHIN by Stuart Sutherland Constable, £14.95, pp. 357 S tuart Sutherland, Professor of Psychol- ogy at Sussex University, is perhaps best...

William Leith INVESTIGATING SEX: SURREALIST DISCUSSIONS 1928-1932 edited by Jose Pierre Verso, L17.95, pp. 215 SEX AND SENSIBILITY by Julie Burchill Grafton, £5.99, pp. 263 P...

Hugo Williams THE FORWARD BOOK OF POETRY: A COLLECTION OF THE BEST POEMS FROM THE FORWARD POETRY PRIZE edited by William Sieghart Forward Publishing, £5.95, pp. 135 T his is...

Gabriele Annan MARIE STOPES AND THE SEXUAL REVOLUTION by June Rose Faber, £14.99, pp. 272 M arie Stopes was the mother of sex education and birth control. In 1918 she published...

way Andro Linklater OF A CERTAIN AGE by Naim Attallah Quartet, DS, pp. 311 Unlike his volume of interviews called Women, which must rank as one of the most tedious books of...

Celestria Noel I n 1993 it will be 40 years since the publi- cation of Casino Royale. Ian Fleming him- self seems to have been quite confident that he would have a bestseller...

Architecture One- eyed monster Alan Powers traces the powerful influence of television on our architecture Y ou know you are shopping in Regent Street nowadays, because of...

Slacker (`15', Metro) Blade Runner: The Director's Cut (`15' , selected cinemas) Busy doing nothing Vanessa Letts A slacker, according to Richard Link- later's film about...

Nicholas Poussin: Tancred and Erminia (Birmingham City Museum and Art Gallery, till 3 January) Love feast James Hamilton P erhaps the greatest wall of paintings in any...

Viva Rossini Rupert Christiansen I t has been rather a good year here. In his bicentenary, Rossini has been much feted by the record companies, and two releases stand out as...

The Illustrators (Christopher Beetles, till 23 December) Glenn Baxter: Further Blandishments (Thomas Gibson, till 22 January) Willie Rushton (Academy Club, till 23 December)...

Sublime inaccuracy Peter Phillips I was sitting recently in the Al-Shani restaurant in the old part of Damascus, awaiting the serving of the usual selection of sub-Lebanese...

Secrets of 007 Alistair McAlpine O n 15 December Sotheby's are to sell a collection of books, manuscripts and memorabilia, all gifts to the London Library's appeal fund. Among...

Frozen waste Martyn Harris T he true age of exploration ended, arguably, with the invention of the aero- plane and certainly with the helicopter, after which it became...

Slowly does it Taki New York I had a wonderful time down in Delray and Palm Beach, where my friend Lord Longford and colleague Nigel Nicolson would be seen as approaching...

Hurt in action Jeffrey Bernard I am becoming increasingly fed up with the misinterpretations my army of detrac- tors put on that awful phrase, 'Jeffrey Bernard is unwell'. I...

Alderney cowed Nigel Nicolson T he disclosure of 27 files on the occupa- tion of the Channel Islands has added little to our knowledge of what went on there in 1940-45, and...

After the fastings and feastings _ • SAINT JANE Frances Fremiot de Chantal seems to have slipped her moorings: her feast used to be in August but now it is on the 12th of this...

Into Europe Raymond Keene T he European Team Championship ended in a further success for Russia, after their Olympic gold at Manila earlier this year. Kasparov and Kramnik...

Basse cuisine Jaspistos I n Competition No. 1757 you were in- vited to supply an extract from the latest cookery book, The Art of Boiling Eggs. This elicited my shortest...

A first prize of £20 and a bottle of Graham's Malvedos 1979 Vintage Port for the first correct solution opened on Thursday, 24 December, with two runners-up prizes of £10 (or,...

Notes and quotes Frank Keating THE OTHER weekend, ITV's intrepid touchline lurker, Jim Rosenthal, bran- dished his microphone at the muddied cus- todian in the polo-neck...

Dear Mary.. . Q. Each year my husband demands that I buy him a new 'toy' for his Christmas pre- sent. In previous years, my purchases have included computers, mountain bikes,...