Notwithstanding the reports of dissension in their ranks, the Palestinian guerrillas have had quite a week. They have blown up many millions of pounds' worth of international...

Heath and the hijackers PETER PATERSON The end of the hijacking affair is not yet in sight as I write this column, and one now tends to believe the Palestine guerrillas when...

Responsibility without power GEORGE GALE It has for several years seemed to me that one of the silliest things Rudyard Kipling ever wrote were the words used by Stanley...

moment it would be churlish to complain.'

How the guerrillas came to town MICHAEL WYNN JONES Into the ranks of the token words of our language, whose effect is to obscure rather than clarify the issues they are...

CHRISTOPHER HOLLIS A recent report by the Medical Council of Alcoholism estimates that there are at least 300,000 sufferers from the disease. It's said the alcoholic curse Is...

Death and the Starfighter FRANK WHITFORD About five years ago a new type of joke en- tered the t3erman language, der Starfighter- whz. The year 1965 had been the worst for the...

A fair-minded people MURRAY KEMPTON New York — New Haven has completed the latest in that series of trials of members of the Black Panther party for crimes running from...

CHRISTOPHER BOOKER What have the following in common: the book on Beethoven which the promenaders presented to Colin Davis last Saturday, the five-volume history of the Royal...

The secret of Agatha Christie ANTHONY LEJEUNE 'You are making up your mind, are you not, whether I am a mere mountebank, or the man you need?' `Yes.' She hesitated. `I'm...

Season of mists . . . BILL GRUNDY A weekend in the north-west so wet and windy that even the wild geese took to walk- ing was obviously an occasion to sit indoors and sample...

Among my souvenirs JOHN ROWAN WILSON When I was young I was often told that the mustard manufacturers made their money, not out of the mustard you ate, but out of what you...

The true university? PETER J. SMITH Dr Peter 1. Smith here replies to the article, 'The non-university?' in last week's SPEC.' TATOR, in which Dr Rhodes Boyson criticised the...

The General's way out dream WILLIAM ARMSTRONG Sir William Armstrong is the Head of the Home Civil Service When we were children my mother was always singing snatches of songs...

BRYAN WILSON The Right to Say We: The Adventures of a Young Englishman at Harvard and in the Youth Movement Richard Zorza (Pall Mall 40s) Academic Freedom in Action Paul Hoch...

CLARENCE BROWN Culture and Commitment: A Study of the Generation Gap Margaret Mead (The Bodley Head 22s) Margaret Mead, Curator Emeritus of Ethnology of the American Museum of...

LEON BRITTAN I Know It Was the Place's Fault Des Wilson (Oliphant 30s) Des Wilson has a remarkable tale to tell. Within three years a young and obscure journalist from New...

JOHN GIELGUD The Actor Managers Frances Donaldson (Weidenfeld and Nicolson 45s) Nothing, of course, is more difficult to assess than the talents and magnetic qualities of star...

JOHN JULIUS NORWICH The Knight and Chivalry Richard Barber (Longmans 75s) It was in AD 778 that Roland's horn rang through Roncesvalles; barely two months ago that I found...

JOHN BARR The Doomsday Book Gordon Rattray Taylor (Thames and Hudson 42s) Last month, midst a clutter of soothing phrases, the annual report of the Chief Alkali Inspectors...

DONALD McLACHLAN Hostage in Peking Anthony Grey (Michael Joseph 50s) I wonder whose fault it is that this account of Anthony Grey's 806 days of solitary con- finement in Peking...

SHIVA NAIPAUL From Columbus to Castro: The History of the Caribbean 1492-1969 Eric Williams (Andre Deutsch 90s) Whether French, English, Dutch, Spanish, Danish...

CAROLA OMAN Letters from Liselotte, Elizabeth Char- lotte Princess Palatine and Duchess of Or- leans, 'Madame', 1652-1722, translated - and edited by Maria Kroll (Gollancz...

BRYAN ROBERTSON Art columns tend to be rather solemn affairs, intent for the most part on trying to explain the unexplainable: for if a painting or sculpture, is totally...

Wagnerian week ELWYN JONES The perfect Wagnerite is impervious to 'the incredible and iniquitous length' of his Master's works. The epithets are those of that scholarly...

Joyless journey PENELOPE HOUSTON It is, of course, Fellini Satyricon. And with good reason. Whatever the origin of this somewhat excessive title—perhaps some pub- licist's...

Scottish search CLEMENT CRISP Where do choreographers come from: under what artistic gooseberry bush are they to be found? The question has dominated much of the history of...

I.O. S.-S.O.S. NICHOLAS DAVENPORT Six months ago on what must have been a very sunny morning a firm of Canadian stockbrokers issued an exhaustive report on one of the world's...

JOHN BULL Wall Street has staged a decent enough rally, and it has persuaded most professional observers that prices are not going to fall much lower than their present level....

Sir: The continuing debate on the proposals to increase postal charges seems to be con- cerned with how to control the Post Office's monopoly. Such discussion, however, avoids...

Sir: Nicholas Davenport states (5 Septem- ber): 'wages have risen this year at the rate of £500 million a year extra.' This is surely a gross under-estimate? Some 20 million...

Sir: Mr Szamuely's 'Personal Column' (29 August) is much exaggerated. Specially the comparison with Lysenko is simply wrong. After all, the opponents of Mr Szamuely use...

Sir: At a time when we are being bulldozed into accepting the metric system there are some facts which should be considered. First, the units of the metric system are not all...

Sir: In your leader (5 September) you write: 'These youngsters, who profess to believe most of all in personal liberty, are ready to side in practice with the most illiberal and...

From John Lewis, Mark Brady, F. E. P. S. Langton, Graham Greene, Dr Israel Shahak, McG. Carslaw, L. B. Escritt, Basil Ash- more, Sir Denis Brogan. Keith R. Simpson, Peter David...

Sir : I was interested to read Simon Raven's impressions (5 September), but they struck me as a little ttop censorious. * Morgan Forster had produced five great novels, two of...

Sir: Crabro (12 September), like other public commentators, seems to have drawn a ques- tionable conclusion from reports concerning the recent escape of the El Al aeroplane. Was...

Sir: I read with particular pleasure Mr Christopher Booker's comments on natural phenomena which from time to time appear in your paper. I too have noticed the pro- liferation...

Sir : The letter of Mr Ross (5 September) leaves my withers unwrung. (I am not quite sure about the origin of this metaphor, but I think the meaning is clear enough.) I had...

Sir : Angus Calder, when reviewing Henry Pelling's Britain and the Second World War (12 September), made a number of com- ments about the study of war and society in general....

Sir : As a drama director of some experience I have long suffered the delusion that a director's job was to interpret his author— if the author is of any importance, at least—...

From the 'Spectator,' 17 September 1870—The great news of the week . . . is the entry of the Italian army into the Roman territory. On Sunday, after repeated discussions in the...

No. 622:-Book of the week Competitors are invited to incorporate the titles of any eight books advertised for in the 'Books Wanted' columns of this week's or next week's...

PHILIDOR .1. Kiss (1st Prize, Hungary, 1942). White to play and mate in two moves: Solution next week. Solution to No. 507 (Ellerman —6nB/R7/...

Pleasures of the north JOHN KERR Scotland, it would seem, has at last achieved, if not independent nationhood, the almost equally elusive condition of justifying its own...

Across 1 Spot that confounded tempting fruit? (6) 4 Brave definition of a blonde (8) 10 A priest cavorting amid musical Cornish seamen (7) 11 Desert traveller has swallowed the...