T he Government wavered over involve- ment in Bosnia; Mr Douglas Hurd, the For- eign Secretary, opposed air strikes for the time being and Mr Major favoured `tougher sanctions'....

Ask not what you can do for History, ask what History can do for you MATTHEW PARRIS A gnosco — I do not know — has ceased to be an answer we dare offer to questions of...

G ot anything coming up at all?' the doctor asked as I lay prone. At least he inquired with mild interest, probably (and rightly) wondering about his fee; unlike the lout at...

Time for the ramblers, scramblers and saboteurs to decide who owns the land 1, . 1' rhe 4•-• AUB ERON WAUG H spirited coriesiXindence in the Times on the use of by-ways or...

wavvistry APR 30 how Anne Applebaum celebrates St George Day with an outsider's look at an introspective country IIPIrt Aliso HOW DO you measure a nation's decline? Not by its...

I HEARD Sir Malcolm Thornton on the Today programme the other day saying that he would be 'meeting with' teachers. And who, pray, is Sir Mal- colm? Why, chairman of the Select...

Charles Glass suggests that the best thing we can do for the Bosnians is to leave them alone Tuzla HISTORY, as Tolstoy defined it, is unfolding in Bosnia Hercegovina. As I...

persist.. . PRISON IS a foreign country: they do things differently there. Thus, a sterile area in prison is not, as in hospital, an area free of germs, but an area free of...

Anne McElvoy argues that nobody can win the Russian referendum because nobody knows what it means Moscow IT WAS ONE of those moments made for American television cameras,...

THE YOUNG King of Servia, Alexan- der I., struck a coup d'etat on Friday week. He had just passed his military examination, and — according to the earliest accounts, since...

Alasdair Palmer talks to 'Jack the Dripper', the American doctor whose patients never wake up Royal Oak, Michigan TO SOME, he is 'a hero . . a kind of sec- ular saint'. To...

Christina Lamb meets an applicant for a position - Emperor of Brazil - which might yet fall vacant Rio de Janeiro THE FRAYING leather-bound visitors' book in the entrance hall...

Michael Heath

Ten good reasons why a first night can sparkle PAUL JOHNSON A someone who, these days, goes to a first night only occasionally, I find the enjoyment much enhanced by its...

Improvement means deterioration, and Sir Peter says it's irreversible CHRISTOPHER FILDES P atria( Hutber was the City Editor who laid down that improvement meant deteri-...

war are strong on emo- tion but weak on logic and history (`The West does not exist', 17 April). Your state- ment, 'If we let them [the Serbs] have Kosovo', ignores, the...

Sir: Boris Johnson provides some disturb- ing reflections on Douglas Hurd's motives for appeasing the Bosnian Serbs (`Douglas Hurd's public conscience', 17 April). There is...

if the Government could be persuaded to allow the formation of one new regiment? I suggest that this new regiment be called `I bet other people's parents don't put their kids...

Sir: Piers Paul Read's article (Exploding the myth of Chernobyl', 17 April) would be laughable if it were not so damaging to a group of people blighted by one of the most...

Sir: Molly Scott (Letters, 10 April), in fol- lowing the fate of Jeffrey Bernard and falling victim to the capital's pavements, draws attention to the question of compen- sation...

Sir: Simon Heifer is indeed a perfection- ist.(`But is this a Tory government?' 10 April). 1 applied his test, ministry by min- istry, to the three previous administrations....

Sir: If John Osborne (Diary, 17 April) is so muddled about his diabetes that he thinks he can get a hypo from forgetting his evening insulin, the Daughters of Eve are not going...

Sir: If your chess correspondent is to use your columns (Chess, 17 April) for partisan pieces about the organisation of the world championship, I think we should be told what...

Sir: It really is too much. Paul Johnson, the sentimental, inoffensive old buffer, content in front of the television with his grandson, Mindful only of his own business and...

Dark and serious Angel James Buchan POET AND DANCER by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala John Murray, f14.99, pp. 199 T his novel, though it is very short, nar- rates two appalling family...

Nigel Spivey THE HERETIC'S FEAST: A HISTORY OF VEGETARIANISM by Cohn Spencer Fourth Estate, 120, pp. 402 A bstain from beans'. A curious dictat, coming from the founder of...

P. D. James DOROTHY L. SAYERS: HER LIFE AND SOUL by Barbara Reynolds Hodder, 125, pp. 398 T here are writers who hold such a perennial fascination for biographers that they are...

Oliver Rackham THE DIVERSITY OF LIFE by Edward 0. Wilson Allen Lane, £22.50, pp. 424 s a boy I read Rachel Carson's won derful book, The Sea Around Us. It intro- duced me to...

John Mortimer SMASH AND GRAB: GANGSTERS IN THE LONDON UNDERWORLD by Robert Murphy Faber, £15.99, pp. 182 I suppose, as a society, we have never been quite so dependent on...

Julie Burchill NICHOLAS RAY: AN AMERICAN JOURNEY by Bernard Eisenschitz, translated by Tom Milne Faber, f20, pp. 599 U h oh — dig that subtitle, weep into your Smith & Wesson...

James Fox THE LIVES OF BERYL MARKHAM by Errol Trzebinski Heinemann, f17.99, pp. 396 B eryl Markham's original memoir, West With the Night, first published in 1942, was an...

by Philip Roth Continuing our occasional series, William Scammell reassesses a famous work of literature They see us in bowlers, suits, or tweeds. They say our fields are neat...

Hugh Trevor-Roper G. M. TREVELYAN: A LIFE IN HISTORY by David Cannadine HarperCollins, £18, pp. 288 I n his time, George Macaulay Trevelyan was the most famous of British...

J. L. Carr E.M. FORSTER: INTERVIEWS AND RECOLLECTIONS edited by J. H. Snape St Martin's Press, £40, pp. 233 T his collection (printed uncomfortably in jet-black ink on...

Art Long live the new! Ian Dunlop welcomes another generation of young artists with the power to shock us T wenty years ago I wrote a book called The Shock of the New. It was...

Arcadia (Lyttelton) The Return of the Prodigal (Orange Tree, Richmond) Et in Arcadia Tom? Sheridan Morley S everal ghosts haunt the long dining- table which dominates the set...

Helen Elwes (Cadogan Contemporary, till 1 May) Luke Elwes: Storyline (Rebecca Hossack, till 15 May) Cousinly contrast Giles Auty B y chance two young artists who bear the same...

Honour bright Alistair McAlpine I have never understood the obsession some people have with medals. I can remember a Conservative peer who wanted desperately to be awarded a...

A Wagner feast Robin Holloway T he BBC didn't provide a seasonal Par- sifal this Easter, but Wagner-lovers have not been deprived. Radio Three has broad- cast all his mature...

Fly on the lens Martyn Harris T he fly-on-the-wall documentary, the drama-doc and the docu-fiction are all rou- tine stuff these days, but The Selling of a Serial Killer...

Body of Evidence ('18', selected cinemas) Accidental Hero ('15', selected cinemas) Kinky and kooky Vanessa Letts I t's embarrassing to have to contribute to the number of...

Buttons for barbarians Taki I had an opportunity to test that old maxim that man was made in God's image. I went to the Whitney Museum of Ameri- can Art and came out an...

Hypo critical Jeffrey Bernard I didn't know that I was in such good company until I read in John Osborne's Diary last week that he too is diabetic. I knew that the delightful...

No more Latin Nigel Nicolson At my preparatory and public schools I spent more time learning Latin and Greek than any other subject, but even in my last year at Eton I was...

I TRUST you all had a magnificent Easter holiday. I had a perfectly splendid jaunt to North Yorkshire, staying with the Penny- backer, Toynbee lot, whose family ramifi- cations...

Raymond Keene LATER this year in London Nigel Short and Gary Kasparov will contest a match for the world crown under the auspices of the Professional Chess Association. As is...

England and St George J aspistos IN COMPETITION NO. 1775 you were asked for an imaginary conversation be- tween St George and Shakespeare, who are reputed to have a common...

Malvedos 1979 Vintage Port for the first correct solution opened on 10 May, with two runners-up prizes of £10 (or, for UK solvers, a copy of Chambers English Dictionary — ring...

Cricket's annual treat Frank Keating EACH succeeding year, do you find your- self cursing the arrival of Wisden because, suddenly, the print is far smaller than the edition of...

Dear Mary.. . Q. For some years, Bob and I have happily shared a pew at morning service. It is ideal- ly situated and is the only one to seat two comfortably, three squashed,...