T HE London Electricity Board privilege case has become so complicated that even papers of the calibre of the Manchester Guardian and the Observer seem to have misunderstood it....

T HE competition in chauvinism which has been going on in France has had its logical result —a military coup. In view of the inflamed state of public opinion in Algiers, the...

TN French North Africa, war; on British Rail- ways, peace. While a gang of soldiers, their Patience exhausted, seize power in Algeria, a single British soldier, his patience...

By RICHARD H. ROVERE T HE morning papers carry some mildly en- couraging recession news. The Labour De- partment reports a drop in the number of unemployment-insurance...

S 112. BRIAN ROBERTSON spoke his last word—an increase in the railwaymen's pay of roughly 7d. in the pound, to start on June 30—and the unions went off to consider the offer in...

D. W. BROGAN The Attack on the Supreme Court

Who blew his brains out on his bedroom floor And still behaved exactly as before. The fact remains that, barring what Mr. Mencken called acts of God of a revolting and unprece-...

G EORGE B1LAINKIN writes : At eleven a.m. in the office of Monsieur Rank, of Jours de France, I was surprised to see a procession of Young men and pretty girls on their way to...

various aspects of Liberal policy. I am privileged to bring this enlighter ment to a different audience. The 1.,*b*r*1 leader answers your queries on party policy. Ask 3*...

THE HOMERIC LEGENDS which the French have woven about sonic of their latter-day military comman- ders usually leave me unmoved, except to admire the Gallic skill of obliterating...

Select Committee on the Obscene Publications Bill make marvellously funny reading to anybody who does not worry about the fact that a remarkable degree of cen- sorship is being...

his evidence made that of Sir Frank Newsam sound sensible, open and reasonable. It reached its nadir when he solemnly announced that when he was recently requested —not,...

pickings because of the bus strike. 'Ordinary people,' they say, squinting at me with one eye through the driving mirror to see whether I am actually wearing a top hat or...

craft carriers into helicopter carriers for anti- submarine work has caused some surprise at NATO headquarters; the only really surprising thing about the decision, I would have...

mishearing the gabble at a green- room cocktail party has confused him with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cul- tural Organisation. Leslie Mallory in the News...

By SIDNEY Z. ELLER* T EN years have gone by since the iron cur- tain came down along the western border of Czechoslovakia; and twenty years since disturb- ances broke out in the...

of Scotch (does one say `butterscottish' or 'double scottish'?) blood in my veins I take up my pen. The National Trust for Scotland, under the chairmanship of the vigorous and...

By D. C. WATT T HE outbreak of revolution in Russia in March, 1917, found Lenin in exile in Switzerland. The story of his return to Russia through Germany 'in a sealed truck...

MAY 18, 1833 THE Ministerial plan for putting an end to slavery is at length fairly before the public; and if we are to believe the West Indian proprietor on the one side, and...

By PETER FLEMING I N Operation Sea Lion (Oxford University Press, 305.) Mr. Ronald Wheatley presents a detailed study, and an objective interpretation, of the German plans for...

Backstage in Moscow By JOAN LITTLEWOOD THE building itself stands in a busy side-street off one of Mos- cow's main boulevards. It is pale green, the colour typical of the...

Champagne 'I'M A displaced person all right. But I've been displaced to some- , where I like more than I liked .2; where I used to be. It's only due to a ridiculous mistake on...

Variations on a Theme. By Terence Rattigan. (Globe.) I Do not often agree with Mr. Harold Hobson. Too often he plays the advocate rather than the judge, decorating an irrelevant...

The Nature of Love By ISABEL QUIGLY The White Nights. (Curzon.)—A Dangerous Age. (Academy.) LOVE stories, you might think, are two a penny in the cinema. Not a bit, if you...

Economic Realities MASON By COLIN TEN new Verdi productions were what Covent Garden originally hoped to put on this season for the centenary of the theatre. As with any dream...

Promoting Good Design By LESLIE ADRIAN THE Council of Industrial Design's exhibition 'Designs of the Year' has had a panning from the design critics. Speaking not as an expert...

Wonder or Die By MILES HOWARD TN an American news magazine I saw a report of 'some work being done by Hans Selye and his team in Montreal on the causes and prevention of...

emalleate certain words. May I express my pious hope that he at any rate will never suffer from pseudolitholychnostaurotic misosis, alopecothereuo- phobia or...

SIR, —Pharos mentions that the polio problem has been treated with sensationalism by some of our politicians, but surely the press is not blameless? The fact that the disease...

press about that splendid feat of arms, Zeebrugge, will end the distortions of the facts: dis- tortions which are undignified, add nothing to the stature of the gallant...

notice on The Young Lions as 'a political diatribe.' The Young Lions has political implications that can be dealt with only in political terms. The Christian charity he mentions...

'My Books of the Year' English Spoken Here Zeebrugg e Polio The Golden Nazi F luoridation A. E. Housman The Shock of Innovation Stress Disorders Cicero T. Ritchie I. C. Wells...

on A. E. Housman to one of your angry young reviewers. I say nothing of Mr. Thwaite's personal judgments, though it would be a simple matter to confute them all, but I am...

SIR,—Leslie Adrian invites me to comment on the views put forward by Mrs. Grant on fluoridation in the same issue (May 2). It would be very unwise to do so. Scientific issues of...

Quigly's restrained and reasoned review of The Young Lions. (a) Considering that the world is enchained by ideologies, you can hardly think out- side them. (b) The world is in...

SIR,—Mr. Graham Hutton, in his interesting articl e 'The Shock of Innovation,' seems to underestirna te , the attention that economists have given to industri a ' innovation. In...

SIR,—Your correspondent Miles Howard, in bi g , report of the SPR Conference last week, did no emphasise, as I think he might 'have done, Ib e direction of change in the...

Brother Savage B Y BERNARD LEVIN T HE law is a ass,' said Mr. Bumble. 'And the . Worst I wish the law,' he added, 'is that he should have his eye opened by experience.' It Is a...

MR. REEVES has selected a hundred-odd tradi" tional poems from the notebooks of Cecil giving unexpurgated texts as Sharp could not. result is delightful, and this book,...

Power and Diplomacy. By Dean Acheson. us. 6d.) THE political position of Mr. Dean Acheson is probably well known in this country. On the one hand, as Secretary of State of the...

By G. J. Warnock. (Home University Library : O.U.P., 7s. 6d.) THE scope of Mr. Warnock's little book is very much more restricted than its title would suggest. In his first...

Selected Writings of Gerard de Nerval. Translated with a critical introduction and notes by Geoffrey Wagner. (Peter Owen, 25s.) pelui . . . qui veut ecrire son reve' (declared...

A History of London Life. By R. J. Mitchell and M. D. R. Leys. (Longmans, 25s.) The Royal Albert Hall. By Ronald W. Clark. (Hamish Hamilton, 25s.) MISS MITCHELL and Miss Leys...

Bourbon Leader: Grover Cleveland and the Democratic Party. By H. S. Merrill; edited by Oscar Handlin. (A. and C. Black, 18s.) GROVER CLEVELAND was the second heaviest President...

A Dictionary of Abstract Painting. By Michel Seuphor. (Methuen, 42s.) ' Brancusi. By David Lewis. (Tiranti, 18s.) DESPITE the detractors and resisters, there's little doubt...

The Political System of Napoleon III. BY Theodore Zeldin. (Macmillan, 24s.) peculiar drawbacks, and the same restless Ye le a personal centralised autocracy; only to be - r e '...

and The Grey Stranger. By Frances Crane. (Hammond, 10s. 6d.) If carnival means 'Nice' to you, and port 'Oporto,' then these detective stories about carnival at Douglas, loM, and...

Othello, Troilus and Cressida and As You Like It. Recorded by the Marlowe Society on Argo Records, £23 (approximately) in total. EQUITY has charged the Marlowe Society of Cam-...

Mighty Fallen. By Charles Whiting. (Cape, 15s.) 14 3 1 Mother was Hanged. By E. S. Willards. (Heinemann, 13s. 6d.) I ' ROUBLE in yet another Arab State. The insurgents ave...

The Tiger Among Us. By Leigh Brackett. (Boardman, 10s. 6d.) Powerful piece about young American who gets wantonly beaten up by gang of youngsters, for fun. The attack is so...

6d.) Newly published but patently earlyish adventure of the half- Australian aboriginal detective Napoleon Bona- parte. Instead of the sun-blasted outback about which Mr....

Road-racing thriller—Silver- stone, Le Mans, the Mille Miglia—by a writer who deals superbly with speed and action. Not so good on human relationships as his excellent previous...

T HROGMORTON STREET never lost its faith in a settlement of the wage crisis on tilt railways and the marking down of prices in the gilt-edged market was very moderate. The new...

By NICHOLAS DAVENPORT WAITING for Godot' would be a good title for the present economic policy of the Treasury. The trouble about 'Waiting for Godot' is that if you wait...

N ORTH Central Wagon and Finance Coll' pany has produced some impressive fig r es do for 1957. Amounts reserved for future profits stt at over 121 per cent, of the hirers'...

ACROSS 1 Escape as depicted by Turner, for example? (8) 5 Suffering seems to be involved for this heathen (6) 9 No thoroughbred this appetiser (8) 10 So to be found twinkling...

By PHILIDOR No. 153. Specially contributed by H. AHUES (Broiler ) ) BLACK (10 men) WHITE (8 men) WHITE to play and mate in two moves: solution tog! week. Solution to last...

SPECTATOR COMPETITION No. 428: Report by Papoose My copy of Chambers's Dictionary has a habit of opening at the page whose first entry is the word 'serendipity.' This always...

of those of its sire and dam (thus, ti foal by Petition out of Footbridge was none': Brief Span). Competitors are asked to invent set of three literary titles, each stemming...

II Aunter. 12 By-passed. 14 Realm. 15 Swellings, 18 Cairngorm. 20 Nomen. 22 lzvestia, 24 Pistol. 26 Carinthia, 27 Onset, 28 Sledded. 29 Tintern. DOWN. — 1 BrIcabrac. 2 Titania....