`Oh, Lord, help us cleanse this world of sinners.' T he Irish Republican Army launched mortar bombs onto London Airport at Heathrow on three days; they all mysteri- ously...

Telephone: 071-405 1706; Telex 27124; Fax 071-242 0603 HOW WARS END T he peace process, we are told, will soon be resumed in Bosnia. This must be the most depressing item of...

Mr Hurd discovers surprising similarities between Europe and a gentlemen's club SIMON HEFFER I n late 1992, at the height of the argu- ments over the Maastricht Bill, some...

I don't suppose anyone would deny, even the politicians who are quick to deny every- thing, that we are going through a particu- larly glum chapter in our island story. I was...

A promising young man, but does he exist? AUBERON WAUGH G ive the Devil his due, it was a very good joke against the despised chattering classes when the Sunday Times managed...

Political pundits make careers out of highlighting the stupidities of politicians. John Patten looks at some of theirs I NO LONGER much care what anyone writes about me, save...

Rebecca Lee attempts to define Deng Xiaoping's place in Chinese history, before the obituarists get there first Xian, China IN THE seventh month of the 37th year of his reign...

`CAN I have the stamps?' my daughter asked when a letter arrived from New Zealand. It was from Mr Peter Wheen of Portobello, who asks: 'You don't do slang, do you? Toe-rag has...

America and Britain are keeping up sanctions against Baghdad because they do not want a collapse in the oil price, argues Tim Llewellyn Baghdad MONA KANDOUKTCHIAN, a vivacious...

The Germans warmly support the Croats. Kenneth Roberts says this reuniting of second world war allies is distasteful Split THE PRIESTS were in black, as were the gunmen —...

persist.. . ONE OF the ambitions of every doctor is to have a disease named after him. This may strike laymen as strange and even perverse: after all diseases are not wings in...

Alan Judd recalls the moment when, thanks to the IRA, he had a violent disagreement with gravity ANYONE CAN get blown up, and sadly it is nowadays not so very unusual. The...

FOR THE VULNERABLE John Plender uncovers a proletarian version of the Lloyd's of London scandal. It is, of course, much bigger WHOM SHOULD we blame for the increasing...

Prince Charles can learn a thing or two from the Wyf of Bath PAUL JOHNSON s ince Charles has launched a new archi- tectural magazine — Perspectives — with a call for the...

Reality is breaking in all over, and it comes as a terrible shock CHRISTOPHER FILDES S cene: Hollywood. Two functionaries are comparing notes. One of them makes the ritual...

THIS WEEK'S cautionary tale from Lloyd's of London comes at the expense of 44 mem- bers who suffered at the hands of Oakeley Vaughan. They tried the effect of suing Lloyd's for...

WHAT IS a department of environmental studies? Something that puts an extra mil- lion pounds on to a college's appeal for funds. So I thought it a bad sign when the Institute of...

WHAT A pleasure to see Flakey Dove storm home in the Champion Hurdle with- out the Chancellor of the Exchequer trying to creep up on her inside. Year after year, chancellors...

THE BANKS have been worrying Alan Abelson, my opposite number at Barron's in New York. In his column 'Up and Down Wall Street' he poses the question: how will they get it wrong...

Sir: Frederic Raphael, in his ranting review of Bryan Cheyette's study of anti-Semitism in English literature, reveals something of his own ignorance of both topics (Books, 26...

Sir: My old friend Paul Johnson is barking up the wrong tree (Another thing, 5 March), because he has failed to under- stand the idea behind the painting of the Guardian women...

Sir: Noel Malcolm's incisive analysis of Mr Douglas Hurd's lamentable misjudgments in respect of the Bosnian crisis has put all of us in his debt CA most undeserved repu-...

Sir: In your leading article of 5 March, you refer to democracy as being the birthright of British citizens in Britain. That this vulgar error has taken such deep root that...

12 Months 6 Months UK El £77.00 El £39.00 Europe (airmail) 0 £88.00 0 £44.00 USA Airspeed 0 US$125.00 0 US$63.00 USA Airmail 0 US$175.00 0 US$88.00 Rest of Airmail 0 £111.00 0...

Sir: I buy and read women's fashion maga- zines, mostly because of my own interest in and about fashion. An aeon ago I was a fashion model, then worked in fashion retailing and...

Sir: Mr Michael Allsopp expresses his indignation that a lady should be allowed to precede a gentleman down the corridors of the Eastern and Oriental Express, so forc- ing her...

Sir: In the spirit of eponyms of dissent such as 'boycott', being 'sent to Coventry' and even the 'Harvey Smith', surely the time has come to find one for women priests. After...

Sir: No problem with Mary Ellen Synon's assertion that Dublin speech conserves many features of 17th-century English (`David Dimbleby gets it backwards', 5 March), but surely...

was no toady — he refused a knighthood rather than compro- mise his independence and he was one of the very few Englishmen of his generation who were not even slightly...

Sir: Field Marshal Sir Francis Festing had a remedy for the peccadilloes of those in high places. On hearing of an indiscretion, he would merely say 'Snip, snip'. This would be...

Sir: When Mr Gordievsky comments on the possible repercussions to others of Aldrich Ames's 'treachery' (`Aldrich Ames, my would-be killer', 5 March), surely he is at the same...

Sir: Your readers who are now pouring into Agnews to see our loan exhibition of Turn- er watercolours arranged to mark my forth- coming retirement from the firm have been taken...

Big unfriendly tyrant Caroline Moorehead ROALD DAHL by Jeremy Treglown Faber, L17.50, pp. 307 T he photograph on the front of Jeremy Treglown's book suggests Fred Astaire: a...

Alec Russell BOSNIA: A SHORT HISTORY by Noel Malcolm Macmillan, f17.50, f9.95, pp. 340 T he Hyatt Regency Hotel, Belgrade has much to recommend it. With unlimited hot water,...

Christopher Hudson ALL THERE IS TO KNOW: A SELECTION FROM THE ELEVENTH EDITION OF THE ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA edited by Alexander Coleman and Charles Simmons Deutsch, f20, pp....

Albert Read THEY WHISPER by Robert Olen Butler Secker, f14.99, pp. 329 W hen a novel promises it will `unflinchingly and lyrically address the sub- ject of modern...

Mira Stout MONKEY'S UNCLE by Jenny Diski Weidenfeld, £14.99, pp. 258 M onkey's Uncle is not so much a novel as an aggrandised account of a nervous breakdown, but the author's...

Perhaps because they're dead, I can declare I loved my cats — and feel it to be proved. I say I love my parents, and I care, but filial love — which seems a stage removed from...

Andro Linklater THE MYTH OF MALE POWER: WHY MEN ARE THE DISPOSABLE SEX by Warren Farrell Fourth Estate, £6.99, pp. 316 A s a result of reading this book, I have made a rather...

Main de Botton BETRAYALS by Charles Palliser Cape, £14.99, pp. 308 C harles Palliser's new novel falls into that genre described by critics as experimental and by the common...

Fiction: Among the Dead by Michael Tolkin, Faber, £5.99 The Fabulous Englishman by Robert McCrum, Picador, £5.99 The Orchard Keeper by Cormac McCarthy, Picador, £5.99 Shared...

Evelyn Joll THE PAINTINGS OF BERNARD DUNSTAN by Bernard Dunstan David & Charles, 140, pp.96 A s reviewers in The Spectator are always scrupulous in declaring an interest, I...

John McEwen `BB': A CELEBRATION edited and introduced by Tom Quinn Whamediffe, £18.95, pp. 303 D enys Watkins-Pitchford, or 'BB' (1905-1990), was the last of his kind, a...

was not one of my best moves the balancing so tricky, the flapping so draughty, the little loosened feathers getting up her nose so that she sneezed and shuddered when stillness...

John Jolliffe CASTLE HOWARD: THE LIFE AND TIMES by Venetia Murray Viking £18, pp. 236 T he most astonishing thing about Castle Howard as a building is that its architect, the...

Art `There are no stamps here ILviv, Ukraine n the Armenian cathedral in Lviv lies a treasure-trove. A fine mediaeval building in a walled courtyard, the cathedral houses no...

L'Elisir d'Amore (English Touring Opera, Sadler's Wells) PeIl6as et Melisande (Welsh National Opera, Birmingham Hippodrome) Fabulously beautiful Rupert Christiansen T here...

Mudanzas (Whitechapel Art Gallery, till 24 April) Desde Londres: Spanish Artists in London (Royal Festival Hall Galleries, till 4 April) Fond memory Giles Auty M y first...

Marking a Millenium Robin Holloway R adio Three is currently into the mid- 1930s, engaged on the kind of corporate enterprise, involving talks, features, plays, as well as...

The Old Ladies (Greenwich) The Flag (Bridge Lane) Omma (Young Vic) Ladies who don't lunch Sheridan Morley T he Old Ladies (Greenwich) has a dis- tinguished family tree: based...

Cool Runnings (PG, Selected cinemas) The Pelican Brief (`12', Selected cinemas) Celluloid cellulite Mark Steyn S tardom is a mixed blessing. John Candy became a star because...

Princely letters Alistair McAlpine `I was really looking for more of a United Nations blue.' the real problem with letters: if you are famous and your letters make money, they...

Murder most mesmerising Martyn Harris I t is hard to say much about a mass mur- der once the charges have been made, but News At Ten (ITV, 10.00 p.m.) has been doing its best,...

For a few lousy bcnks Taki I f sex is about inoculating oneself against desire, I simply cannot understand why Sir Anthony Buck married that soi-disant Spanish woman whom I...

Beauty is (half-)truth Nigel Nicolson I n the discussion of William Walde- grave's now famous statement, 'In excep- tional cases it is necessary to say something to the House...

Home, sweet home Jeffrey Bernard I came home last Sunday to discover that my wheelchair will not go into the bath- room and will just go into the kitchen with an inch to spare...

Kim, gave me the chance to investigate the Italian connection in south-west Scotland. It has to do with food, and with a place in the Appennines called Barga. Dumfries claims...

Acrostic Jaspistos IN COMPETITION NO. 1821 you were invited to write an acrostic poem in which the first letters of each line spell out `MAJOR'S GOVERNMENT'. Has the...

Video nasty Raymond Keene IN LINARES, Anatoly Karpov has scored the greatest tournament triumph of his life, finishing ahead not only of Kasparov but also of every legitimate...

11D 12A (PHYSICAL EDUCATION PROGRAMMES) for the 28D 41A (KEEP FIT ENTHUSIAST) and 10D and 1A 18D. First prize: Sue Hay, Wolverhamp- ton; Runners-up: Dolf Mootham, London W11;...

I J GRAHAM'S - 1 PORT CROSSWORD W&J GRAHAM'S PORT r A first prize of £25 and a bottle of Graham's Malvedos 1979 Vintage Port for the first correct solution opened on 5...

What happened in 1824? I invite you to find out and write an account (maximum 150 words) by an imaginary contemporary journalist of that real public event. Entries to...

Mistaken identity Frank Keating WAS IT peverse mischief or a gormless fluke that had Radio 4's warbling Morning Service this week coming from the chapel of Dean Close School...

Dear Mary. Q. I was recently involved in a dilemma over tipping and would like your advice on how I should have dealt with it. I was driv- ing along Chelsea Embankment on a...