The airport terminal (with apologies to Henry Moore) I t was a bad week for Her Majesty's Official Opposition: the Conservatives held Kensington in the first by-election of the...

SPECTATOR The Spectator, 56 Doughty Street, London WC1N 2LL Telephone 01-405 1706; Telex 27124; Fax 242 0603 INGLORIOUS RECESSIONAL C urrent visitors to the Banqueting House,...

IN Chester last week, two fathers were found guilty of sexually abusing their chil- dren. Because the children were the men's own, the judge ordered that the culprits should not...

The embarrassment of riches in the Whitehall bazaar NOEL MALCOLM A s MPs begin to wind down for their long summer recess, there is one lone figure walking the corridors of...

T alking about the CPS, I really do think -- t that young David Willetts, its director of studies, should take a bit more care, in his B oth the Sunday Times and the Obser- ver...

Do the ordinary people really want Mrs Gaddafi for their Leader? AUBERON WAUGH F or as long as I can remember we have all been telling Nigel Lawson that he is much too...

Mrs Thatcher loves Marks & Spencer. But the great chain depended upon a social uniformity which her policies MARKS & Spencer is under attack from one of its most loyal...

Paul Cooper argues that Western cynicism about Iran is now misplaced WHEN President Khamenei announced his country's unconditional acceptance of the UN Security Council's...

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Become a subscriber to The Spectator and save £12 a year on the regulal UK newsstand pride — that's 76p a week, or less than 71p if you take out a three year subscription....

Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, at the convention, wonders why Jesse Jackson has allowed himself to be tamed Atlanta A SON of Greek immigrants, married to a Jew, and a poor black...

Michael Nicholson fears the return of the Killing Fields to Cambodia Phnom Penh THERE IS only one cinema in Phnom Penh. It is the only one in the country. That it survived is...

Myles Harris traces the decline of the general practitioner in the National Health Service BEFORE 1948 family doctors made their living from a mixture of private fees,...

Roy Kerridge joins Little Italy as it celebrates itself A FEW weeks ago, our local community centre and dance-hall were hired by an Italian social club. As usual, the man from...

appalled by the vulgarity of Mr Peregrine Worsthorne's attack on Lady Antonia Fraser. To launch such an onslaught on the basis of second- hand reports of a private political...

Pompous Perry Sir: My first husband, the late Hugh Fraser, who had a good sense of the ridiculous, would have roared with laugh- ter at Peregrine Worsthorne's concept of the...

Sir: The point that Alexandra Artley com- pletely misses (Letters, 16 July), whilst riding her 'children's rights' hobby-horse, is that in Cleveland, as in Leeds, the children...

Sir: Your editorial (9 July) states that, in 1982, Iran brought down an aeroplane on a flight from Cyprus to Teheran with the loss of 14 people, including the Algerian Fore- ign...

my money back? Hugh Fraser would have had no time either for the sort of false sentiment which Peregrine Wors- thorne attempts to foist upon his open- minded good nature, or for...

Sir: In his article 'The Anglican Unsettle- ment' (16 July), A. N. Wilson rightly praises the courage of Archbishop Des- mond Tutu in restraining violent mobs. But it is not...

SUBSCRIBE TODAY - Save 15% on the Cover Price! RATES 12 Months 6 Months UK 0 £45.00 0 £23.00 Europe (airmail) 0 £55.00 0 £28.00 USA Airspeed 0 US $90 0 US$45 Rest of...

Sir: Apropos the correspondence stimu- lated by William Deedes's evocative memoir of Munich (Letters, 25 June), it is difficult now to recall the degree to which Public opinion...

of Ball-Ball? I have a book, published by the British Ball-Ball Association in 1926 and written by C. F. Hewitt, entitled The History of the Game of Ball-Ball. The game is quite...

Sir: I must object to P. J. Kavanagh describing the Australian wombat as 'a kind of small brown-furred pig' (Life and letters, 4 June). Several friends to whom I read this...

Sir: We have just eaten your cookery correspondent's Ratafia Cream (9 July) for luncheon. We are forced to conclude that she either left out a couple of ingredients, was...

V ividly do I recall hilarious passages from Clive James's Unreliable Memoirs. Not as vividly as I would wish, agreed, nor can I now check back. That book, or rather those...

J. Enoch Powell THE EMPIRE AT BAY: THE LEO AMERY DIARIES, 1929-1945 edited by John Barnes and David Nicholson Century Hutchinson, £19.95, pp. 1,075 E ight years after The...

Under every weather: Skies primed by rainbows, Clouds lilac from a thunderous sun, In light as white as paper Jack followed his vision from plane to plane. Back home, he hauled...

John Zametica HESS: A TALE OF TWO MURDERS by Hugh Thomas Hodder & Stoughton, f12.95, pp. 195 T he man who died in Spandau prison last year was not (repeat not) Rudolf Hess....

Peter Jenkins THE INQUIRING EYE: A SELECTION OF THE WRITINGS OF DAVID WATT edited by Ferdinand Mount Penguin, f9.95, pp. 343 O n 5 February, 1975, I ran into David Watt at...

Elizabeth Berridge ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING by Margaret Forster Chatto & Windus, £14.95, pp.416 SELECTED POEMS OF ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING introduced by Margaret...

Frances Partridge THINKING FACES by Janet Stone Chatto & Windus, f13, pp. 128 T he only self-portrait Janet Stone in- cludes in her fascinating collection takes the form of...

Richard Ingrams YOUNG BETJEMAN by Bevis Hillier Murray, f15.95, pp. 479 hen Penelope Chetwode told her parents Field Marshal Sir Philip and Lady Chetwode that she wanted to...

Become a subscriber to The Spectator and save £12 a year on the regular UK newsstand price - that's 76p a week, or less than 71p if you take out a three year subscription....

I do not know whether Margaret Tarrant (of 'Jesus Among the Bluebells' fame) ever painted fairies, but if she had she would almost certainly have come up with some- thing like...

Saigon (`18', Selected cinemas) Just a backdrop Hilary Mantel A . t first the cinema dealt with the Vietnam war by sidling up to it with aPposite metaphors: Apocalypse Now....

Live indulgence Marcus Berkmann I t is turning into rather a busy summer on the five circuit. Barely has one megastar flown out after the usual triumphant series of shows than...

No need to go to Borneo Wendy Cope Q ueueing in a shop the other day, I heard the following exchange on the radio: `You're Elaine and you like weeding.' `No, no. Reading.'...

Taking to the hills Taki Siena o ror those of you not familiar with what Wallace Arnold refers to as unEnglish languages, a vendita diretta means that anyone armed with...

Crumbling urns Alice Thomas Ellis I 'm going to talk about the weather. I haven't talked about anything else for days now. There doesn't really seem to be anything else. Our...

Nicked again Jeffrey Bernard 0 ne day last week I thought my luck had changed. I was sitting alone at the bar stroking a drink with a swizzle-stick when an extremely...

4,_.4 04 L tih_joik a One can start the game anywhere in the food production process but, most often, it works backwards from the initial observa- tion: 'Those two chaps three...

I n Playing to Win (Batsford £5.95) Grandmaster Jim Plaskett has set down his thoughts on chess, the universe and every- thing. The title does not truly do justice to the...

I n Competition No. 1532 you were in- vited to supply an extract from an obituary of Jaspistos, points to be deducted for accuracy of fact, deliberate or accidental. My mother...

from 6, 16, etc.; and radial pairs 2/8 (districts), 4/14, 9/29, 10/ n, 15/36, 17/6 (film), 19/34, 20/37 (State capitals), 23/32, 27/39 (song- writers.) Winners: Mrs M. Purdie,...

A first prize of £20 and two further prizes of £10 (or, for UK solvers, a copy of Chambers Dictionary, value £13.95 — ring the words 'Chambers Dictionary' above) for the...

A song of release, please (maximum 16 lines), on the part of a motorist who, for one reason or another, can no longer drive. Entries to Competition No. 1535' by 5 August.

Arnold OUR cheeky young editor has buttonholed me to offer advice on books to take en vacances. Cheeky, because he is fully aware of my voracious appetite for tomes aplenty. How...