When asked on Tuesday to say who will be presenting the Conservative Party's authoritative definition of policy on pay, Sir Charles Johnston, Chairman of the conference, said,...

The conversion of Paul Ferdinand Mount Brighton Defectors must be brushed aside. All human organisations — nations, political parties, bureaucracies and businesses alike —...

Brighton 'He eats more oysters than the Dukes' was the saying attributed to a waiter at the Beef steak club with reference to Paul Johnson, who this week addressed a...

Graham Greene's Journey Without Maps, an account of his first visit to Africa published in 1936, is to be reissued by Bodley Head in November. He has written a new introduction...

Our Moroccan future Auberon Waugh Casablanca My search for the clinic or nursing home where Jan Morris had her famous operation has come to nothing. Nobody knows where it is,...

Tim Garton Ash Berlin Does such a thing as 'Germany' still exist? The Federal Republic (West Germany) claims that it does: there are, it says, two German states, but only one...

Nicholas von Hoffman Washington Ian Smith and one of his black buddies turned up here and made a flying pass at lopping a wreath on the tomb of the Unknown Soldier but was...

Hugh Fraser 'Geopolitics' is an ugly word, almost as ugly as Hitler' s odious and disastrous guru, Alfred Rosenberg, who first introduced it. But, on returning from Israel, one...

Peregrine Worsthorne Pitt once declared, during the Napoleonic wars, that England had saved herself by her exertions and would save Europe by her example. Mr Bernard Nossiter,...

Prince Bismarck spoke on Wednesday for the second time in favour of the AntiSocialist Bill. He declared that he was in favour of all means for relieving workmen from need, and...

George Gale It is only a few days since the ViceChancellor of Liverpool University said that in the future the universities would have to accept lower standards of entry. This...

Christopher Booker It may be put down as a minuscule sign of the times that it was only, ironically, an industrial dispute which last Saturday prevented the Daily Telegraph...

Grace Wyndham Goldie There are several ways of destroying the quality of British broadcasting. Two of these, both rejected in the Twenties by the early Broadcasting Committees,...

Can of worms Patrick Marn ham According to Mr Denis McShane, the President of the National Union of Journalists, 'the Union is considering whether or not to withdraw its...

Bluff or no? Nicholas Davenport The Blackpool drama passed without convulsing the City. Naturally they did not like what they heard and saw on the box but the conviction is...

Sir: If I had not actually read Mr Xan Smiley's article (30 September) on Rhodesia I would not have believed it Possible for anyone to have written at such length on the current...

if he believes that his all - party conference on Rhodesia will bring Peace to that strife-torn land. Attem pts at r econciliation of the Patriotic Front leaders and the...

makes one good point and several poor ones. He quite rightly suggests that if the i nstitutions (civil service, academia, judici ary) are handed over relatively intact this...

Sir: Michael Foot, writing about Ignazio Saone (23 September), tells us that 'for some reason not easily discernible he is one of those prophets who was never accorded proper...

Sir: I do not think that Mr Geoffrey Wheatcroft is quite correct in his 'Last Word' in the 30 September issue entitled 'Singing songs'. He states that 'Beethoven's quartets have...

Sir: So the Ministry of Defence do what they can 'to alleviate the problems' of low-flying aircraft 'by spreading the burden around as fairly as possible' (Letters, 30...

Sir: When tuning in to Radios 3 and 4 I sometimes find it difficult to avoid getting the regional version of local radio, Radio Bristol, and the other day I heard a voice say,...

Sir: I am writing a biography of Sarah Grand (Frances McFall) 1862-1943, author of The Heavenly Twins, The Beth Book and other novels, as well as being a suffragist. I should be...

Ferdinand Mount C onservative Dissidents: Dissent within the Parliamentary Conservative Party ( 197 0 - 1974) Philip Norton (Temple smith 210) Dr Norton states his thesis nice...

Patrick Cosgrave Burma: 1942 - 45 Raymond Callahan (Davis-Poynter 0.50) Poor Burma. Of the many tracts of the British Empire acquired in a fit of absence of mind she was the...

Collor Cruise O'Brien N or th of South: An African Journey Shiva Naipaul (Deutsch £6.50) This is an account of a journey in Kenya, Tanzania and Zambia. The writer, unlike mos t...

Benny Green Shadow Box George Plimpton (Deutsch £6.95) It is not easy to write well about sport. Many men have tried it and very very few have succeeded, Hazlitt in the...

John Graham The Encyclopaedia of Gambling Peter Arnold (Collins £6.95) if y o u go into the average bookshop and manage to fight your way past the shelves groaning with...

Paul Ableman The Clique Ferdinand Mount (Ghetto & Windus £4.95) There are five or six novels racing for the winning post across the uneven turf of this book. Home first, by a...

Rodney Milnes Der Ring des Nibelungen (Covent Garden) There is without doubt a powerful mind behind the Royal Opera's Ring. Whether it has been put to the service of Wagner is...

Haunting Peter Jenkins The Lady From The Sea (Royal Exchange , M anchester) IvanOv (Old Vic) An e xceptional actress is needed to anchor The Lady From The Sea in the depths of...

Ambiguities John McEwen It is difficult to imagine Bob Law's moreor-less white-on-white and all black paintings causing much righteous indignation anywhere except in...

Potboiler Ted Whitehead Slavers (Filmcenta) With Roots in the ascendant, I suppose a film about the Imperial land-grab in Africa and about the conflict between rival slave...

Northerner Gavin Stamp With Sir Hugh Casson as President, it is to he expected that the Royal Academy should give more attention to that often neglected art: architecture. But...

Fair play Taki The title 'high life' is misleading as I suddenly hit a snag in the pursuit of the good life. The reasons are simple. I went to Yugoslavia, for sport. Never...

Anticipatory Jeffrey Bernard Recent abuse I've received from my seemingly dwindling band of readers has come in two forms. There have been face-to-face confrontations with...

PO blues Geoffrey Wheatcroft The Post Office is run by maniacs and half-wits. That may seem an exaggerated , hyperbolic statement, a cheap attempt to grab attention. So before...

In my column last week I made an unfortunate ill-founded reference to the death of the Picture Editor of the Sunday Times, Mr Steve Brodie. The passage stated that the Sunday...