T he government was defeated in the Lords over its attempt to repeal Section 28 of the Local Government Act, which for- bids the knowing promotion of homosexu- ality in schools....

JULIE BURCHILL M y mother died last month, and I do miss her. I miss her most of all because she was the only person I've ever known who was remotely like me. This is the curse...

The week that Mr Mandelson wobbled and Sinn Fein reverted to type BRUCE ANDERSON T he latest political crisis in Ulster could have an unprecedented outcome. For the first time...

Damned if they hid and damned if they were visible MATTHEW PARRIS M y grandmother was the kindest of creatures; good-hearted and sociable, she would not have hurt a fly. In...

Dreaming spires? Come off it. More like waking nightmare. Three Oxford undergraduates — Bijan Omrani, George Baily and Catharine Gulick — issue a challenge to their university...

The Serb leader has tricked his people into believing they are victims, says Boris Johnson Belgrade OK, so they bumped off one member of the Milosevic government. But what the...

William Cash reveals Betty Boothroyd's role as the understudy chatelaine at Labour's very own Cliveden THEY say it was a terrific Millennium Eve party that the Rt Hon. Betty...

IF you do not want to read a word that the Oxford English Dictionary tells me is `not in polite use', then look away now and skip to the second paragraph. It is just that Sir...

Rowan Pelling talks to Jack Straw about sex, drugs, burglary and Blackburn Rovers A MATRONLY lady from the Home Office reception desk escorts me to the seventh floor. In the...

Michael Heath

India's flexible character is being ravaged by Hindu fundamentalists, says Trevor Fishlock Varanasi MILKY morning light revealed the jum- bled outlines of India's holiest city:...

Julian Manyon on the agony of Russian parents waiting for news of their sons Moscow THE military history of Russia is littered with desperate battles to escape encir- clement:...

A weekly survey of the things our rulers want to prohibit LEGISLATORS are a little like wash- ing-machine salesmen: they would always rather be selling us a new model than be...

The increase in prison suicides is evidence not of a repressive regime, but of leniency, observes Theodore Dalrymple THERE were more suicides in our prisons last year than in...

We must forgive our enemies, but what about our friends? PAUL JOHNSON T he attempt by the European Union to tell the Austrians how to vote is an absurd example of our...

From Mr Andrew Gilligan Sir: Geoffrey Hoon's hair-trigger response (Letters, 5 February) to my piece on Tri- dent underlines the Ministry of Defence's sensitivity about this...

From Mr Malcolm Jackson Sir: One of the small mysteries of the pre- sent age is how the originally vaguely pejora- tive term 'nuclear family' (social isolation, lack of wider...

From Mr Jonathan Manthorpe Sir: Ross Clark's quip (Banned wagon, 29 January) that perhaps the only hope for white Anglo-Saxon smokers is the discovery that ethnic minorities...

From Lady Mortimer Sir: Red Ken's heroic plan to ban fox-hunt- ing from Brent is surely to be applauded by all right-thinking people. But he does not go far enough. It is time...

From Mr Michael Smith Sir: Paul Johnson's speculation (And another thing, 5 February) that the word `quark' could have been invented by Edward Lear was close — but no banana. It...

From Mr Adrian Weak Sir; Sarah Sands shows commendable con- cern over the anxiety caused to small boys by the onset of the growth of pubic hair when they are in their early...

From Mr Peter Walton Sir: In Mark Steyn's article on Hedy Lamarr (Arts, 29 January), he quotes Hedda Hopper's description of her as `orchidaceous' without, perhaps, realising...

From Mr Oliver Hume Sir: While accepting that the legendary `vicious bile to column inch' ratio in Ms Burchill's writing is calculated to shock or irritate, rather than to...

From Viscountess Sidmouth Sir: In his review of Alan Powers's book on the work of Francis Pollen (Books, 29 Jan- uary), Christopher Montgomery put for- ward the quaint idea that...

Dog devouring dog used not to be a story. Now it is STEPHEN GLOVER E ver since I entered Fleet Street I have heard occasional rumours about financial journalists enriching...

More than a fighting cock Philip Hensher THE PALE ABYSSINIAN: A LIFE OF JAMES BRUCE by Miles Bredin HaiperCollins,177.99, pp. 290 B oswell couldn't warm to James Bruce, the...

Kate Grimond DRESSING UP FOR THE CARNIVAL by Carol Shields Fourth Estate, £13.99, pp. 198 A concert harp falling from an upstairs window knocks a young woman to the ground in...

Jonathan Sumption THE TEMPLARS by Piers Paul Read Weidenfeld, £20, pp. 350 T he Templars were founded a few years after the conquest of the Holy Land by the First Crusade in...

Allan Mallinson THE LETTERS OF LIEUTENANT- COLONEL CHARLES A COURT REPINGTON: MILITARY CORRESPONDENT OF THE TIMES, 1903-1918 edited by A. J. A. Morris Sutton, £50, pp. 380 ho...

Alexander Waugh IGOR STRAVINSKY by Stephen Walsh Cape, £25, pp. 698 S travinsky could never claim to have looked attractive. He was small with rotten teeth almost from the...

Katie Grant DON'T READ THIS BOOK IF YOU'RE STUPID by Tibor Fischer Secker, £10, pp. 248 B ooks which have pretentiously jokey covers, even more pretentiously jokey titles, and...

D. J. Taylor THE ANGELIC DARKNESS by Richard Zimler Arcadia, £11.99, pp. 247 T he Last Kabbalist of Lisbon, Richard Zimler's previous novel, set among the Jewish community of...

Jonathan Keates M by Peter Robb Bloomsbury, £25, pp. 569 I f, as Nicholas Poussin once gloomily pronounced, Caravaggio came into the world to destroy painting, then painting...

Herb Greer THE QUEST FOR COSMIC JUSTICE by Thomas Sowell The Free Press, $25, pp. 214 F or some years, most recently in The Vision of the Anointed, the American con- servative...

Ian Dunlop BOOGIE-WOOGIE by Danny Moynihan Duck Editions, £9.99, pp. 254 I magine paying over £1,000,000 at auc- tion for a ceramic urinal which probably cost £100 to make, or...

Francis King JULIAN GRENFELL by Nicholas Mosley Persephone, tel: 0171 253 5454, £10(including p+p), pp. 411 D espite its title, this fine biography, first published in 1976 and...

Patrick Skene Catling LOST IN THE FUNHOUSE: THE LIFE AND MIND OF ANDY KAUFMAN by Bill Zehme Fourth Estate, £12, pp. 366 t is difficult, if not impossible, to think of a great...

Jeremy Lewis I first met Peter Levi in 1992, and, for some curious reason, I expected to dislike him. It was important that I should stifle such feelings, since someone had...

Fiction: The Château by William Maxwell, Harvill, £10.99 Chocolat by Joanne Harris, Black Swan, £6.99 Our Fathers by Andrew O'Hagan, Faber, £6.99 Remembrance Day by Henry...

Let the past be the future Roger Kimball on how museums are in danger of becoming emporia for the ephemeral T he evening of Tuesday, 25 January was filthy weather in New York....

Live in Your Head (Whitechapel Art Gallery, till 2 April) Thinking the unthinkable II Martin Gayford I n 1970 the artist Keith Arnatt exhibited a work entitled 'Is it Possible...

Arresting originality Stuart Nicholson A t the end of last month, the Barbican Jazz series opened its sixth year with a con- cert by the saxophonist, composer and arranger...

American Buffalo (Donmar Warehouse) Bash (Almeida) Five O'Clock Angel (King's Head) Power play Sheridan Morley I n a powerhouse week for violent Ameri- can drama, back to the...

The Seagull (Swan Theatre, Stratford) A perfect balance Patrick Carnegy F ollowers of theatrical events will be aware that the first night of the RSC's new Seagull was...

Otello (Royal Opera House) Madame Butterfly (Opera North, Leeds; Albert Hall) Thwarted love Michael Tanner T wo performances, very different, of Madama Butterfly in a...

For love and money Peter Phillips I wonder what Vivaldi said when the authorities at the Ospedale della Pieta asked him to compose another concerto for their orphaned girls....

The End of the Affair (18, selected cinemas) Triangular dilemma Mark Steyn I t's not often that I get to review a movie based on a book by a Spectator film critic — in this...

The nobbling game Michael Vestey I f Today presenters John Humphrys or James Naughtie were suddenly fired by the BBC they would probably never know the real reason for it....

Enjoying success Robin Oakley If they were still casting Ealing Comedies they would not have to look further than Jean Broadhurst and her partner Matt Archer for the public...

Deeply shocked James Delingpole T he other day, eminent left-wing histo- rian Andrew Roberts came bounding up to me at a party and said, 'Look. There's something really...

Chicory complications Simon Courtauld T he one thing I thought I knew about chicory — one of the very best of winter vegetables — is that the French call it endive, while they...

Alpine drama Taki Rougemont here is fear and loathing in this beau- tiful, chocolate-box alpine village, with gangs of Swiss vigilantes searching our houses and demanding...

Domestic servitude Toby Young E velyn Waugh said the great thing about being a foreign correspondent is that, irrespective of how dull your life is, all your friends imagine...

Get on with it Leanda de Lisle F armers — go forth and diversify! It is, if Tony Blair is to be believed, the answer to all your problems. You can try organic farming,...

Homophobic musings Petronella Wyatt I have actually found myself, recently, from time to time, harbouring frankly homophobic thoughts. The other day a female friend suggested...

Idiot or genius? Andrew Robson UNFORTUNATELY I have not been able to track down the declarer on this deal. The two defenders — US World champions Nick Nickell and Dick Freeman...

IN a certain kind of film, gourmet dinners are the prelude to seduction. In the first scene, a man and woman in evening-dress discover a mutual attraction across a restaurant...

Erewhemos Jaspistos IN COMPETITION NO. 2122 you were invited to describe an imaginary place of interest, horror or delight. I recommend the paperback Dictionary of Imaginary...

The Ultimate Islay Malt. C RdbN www.ardbeg.com CHESS Alexander the Great Raymond Keene IN 1994 a 17-year-old Russian created a tremendous stir when he won the Lloyds Bank...

A first prize of £30 and a bottle of Graham's award-winning, Late- Bottled Vintage Port for the first correct solution opened on 28 February, with two runners-up prizes of £20...

Welcome error of his ways Simon Barnes IT is strange the way that a person will leave your life in disgrace and then, when he turns up again, you find that you are oddly...

Dear Mary.. . Q. The other day I chanced upon a mal- odorous object on the floor of the office. Close examination left no doubt that this was a dog turd. Such specimens have...