24 MARCH 1961

Page 3

WANTED: ESTATE MANAGERS

The Spectator

01WMANcito - r's Privacy Bill has had a pre- dictably hostile reception from the press, which it is tempting to dismiss as prejudiced and unfair. But, as editorial writers have...

The Spectator

The Spectator

No. 6926 Established 1828 FRIDAY, MARCH 24, 1961

Portrait of the Week— BY A 90-63 VOTE of the

The Spectator

Parliamentary Labour Party, the party whip was withdrawn from five Labour MPs—Michael Foot and Sydney Silver- man among them—for having voted against the Army Estimates, in...

Page 4

Tariff Reform

The Spectator

MYRISONMENT in this country is still based on 1 what'has been described as the tariff system: the aim is to provide a punishment appropriate to the crime rather than to the...

Out of Court

The Spectator

A FTER giving judgment in the Restrictive Practices Court last week Mr. Justice Dip- lock referred to a comment in the Spectator during the hearings, in which we drew attention...

Trigger Fingers

The Spectator

A FTER all these years of disappointments, it is hard to summon up much enthusiasm for the reopening of the Geneva conference on the abolition of nuclear tests. Still, the fact...

In Transit

The Spectator

Y all accounts the Prime Minister has stood D firm behind his Colonial Secretary's White Paper, rejecting Sir Roy Welensky's criticism§ and blandishments; but the smile on the...

Page 5

Next Week

The Spectator

'There is something which, like a malig- nant disease, is eating away the enthusiasm and successfully preventing all of us from doing anything like the work we arc capable of.'...

Westminster Commentary

The Spectator

The 'Potamus Takes Wing By BERNARD LEVIN The instinctive repugnance felt for the Con- servative Party by people like myself (I have often said that my right hand would •fly up...

Page 6

DEFENCE FUND A small committee has been formed to raise

The Spectator

funds which will make it possible for the Bahraini prisoners on St. Helena to engage in further legal proceedings, if they wish, to obtain their release. It consists of two...

Stand Fast

The Spectator

B y 1 . I2 . NI . CREIGHTON T HE discussions and decisions which have been going on privately between British and Federal government representatives about Northern Rhodesia...

Page 8

Press and People

The Spectator

By JO GRIMOND, MP T ye first thing the press needs is a good Press Officer. The Little Tweedledee Bowling Club could not have conducted its Public Rela- tions worse than Mr....

EASTER, 1961 Owing to the holiday period the Spec- tator

The Spectator

will be published a day early next week : on Thursday, March 30.

Page 9

Foreigners in Etobicoke

The Spectator

From MORDECAI RICHLER MONTREAL W E were, as I recall it, embarrassed to be Canadians. Charged with it, we always had a self-deprecating joke ready. At college, during the...

Page 12

The Serpent in Happy Valley

The Spectator

By SIMON RAVEN M ANY qualities arc commonly imputed to colonial settlers, among them industry, greed, courage and obstinacy; but during the ten months odd which 1 spent as a...

Page 15

MILTON

The Spectator

SIR,—Professor Ford and Mr. Maxwell, each in his own way (faux bonhomme and cross-patch), suggest that 1 was lying in my rejoinder to Dr. Leavis. Let us call this the...

SIR,—The letters from Mr. Boris Ford and Mr. J. C.

The Spectator

Maxwell are all very well, but I still find Dr. Leavis's attack on Professor Kermode extraordinary. Must every disagreement with the doctor's views be inter- preted as personal...

'Murder' Harvey Cole Milton Frank Kermode, A. E. Dyson Chalk

The Spectator

From Cheese Clive Barnes The New Bible David Holbrook Living with a Butterfly George Ordish, J. H. Flint In Hospital with my Son Jane Thomas Press Council Philip Moleman...

Page 16

LIVING WITH A BUTTERFLY

The Spectator

SIR,—Poor Pyramus! or rather Pyrameis, for what Mr. Campbell had was a doomed Pyrameis atalaina, a DP, a refugee from France. These beautiful crea- tures always overwinter as...

IN HOSPITAL WITH MY SON

The Spectator

SIR,--Mrs. lay may be interested to know that an Association has been formed in her own constituency (and her husband's parliamentary one) of North Battersea for. to quote her...

SIR,—Your correspondent, Mr. Michael Campbell, is quite clearly accurate in

The Spectator

his observations and it should suffice to say that his butterfly was behaving in the way usual of its kind. The question I would put to you, sir, is why does a person with...

CHALK FROM CHEESE

The Spectator

SIR, —I hold no particular brief for the Minister of Housing , and Local Government, and certainly it seems from the facts presented by Mr. Levin that his action regarding the...

POLLYANNA

The Spectator

Sta,-1 am indeed grateful to Kenneth Allsop for revealing the quagmires of perverted sexuality con- cealed below the surface of some of our childhood classics. The intellectual...

THE NEW BIBLE

The Spectator

SIR,—Folksongs were a popular literary form which embodied metaphorical modes of contemplating the nature of experience, sexual, and sometimes mysti- cal: God is the branch and...

PRESS COUNCIL

The Spectator

SIR,—I have always admired the News of the World for achieving an immense circulation, a feat which is, no doubt, due to the use of the finest methods of journalism. However, I...

Page 17

Theatre

The Spectator

Stone-Cold Symbols By BAMBER GASCOIGNE The Lady from the Sea. (Queen's.)—The Music Man. - (Adclphi.)—The Hollow Crown. (Ald- wych.) EACH new English ver- sion of Ibsen's plays...

WITHIN THE FAMILY?

The Spectator

SIR,—To compare Australia's colour policy with Ver- woerd's, and to call it 'ruthless in the same way, is to lie. We do keep coloured people out of the country, but we do not...

TRADING STAMPS

The Spectator

SIR.—Whatever the merits of obliging the domestic consumer to buy herself a present, trading stamps are not, surely—as quoted by Mr. Winner--a 'new sales device'? This form of...

OPEN PLAN

The Spectator

S111.—Kenneth Robinson says that houses at the Ideal Home Exhibition show improvement because of wider adoption of the open plan. What in fact has the open plan to recommend it...

Page 19

Opera

The Spectator

Zettel, Squenz and Schnauz By DAVID CAIRNS THERE is nothing like a change of viewpoint, a totally new inflexion, for testing your opinion of a favourite work. Having had it...

Page 20

Cinema

The Spectator

No Recriminations By ISABEL QUIGLY Stars. (Hampstead Play- house.)—The Sins of Rachel Cade. (War- ner.) Yes, we know the facts, it is all too familiar for surprise or even, in...

Page 21

Telev.s.on

The Spectator

Out on Top By PETER FORSTER HEREWITH tWO axioms concerning politicians and television, demon- strated yet again by the close coverage of the Commonwealth Prime Ministers'...

Page 23

SPRING BOOKS

The Spectator

Crazy Young Allies By DAN JACOBSON O Cities stink; our politicians lie; our military men send hydrogen bombs flying round and round the world. our teachers resign to get...

Page 24

The Restored

The Spectator

In a hand like a bowl Danced my own soul, Small as an elf, All by itself. When she thought I thought She dropped as if shot. 'I've only one wing,' she said, The other's gone...

Two Poems by Theodore Roethke

The Spectator

Advice to One Committed Swift's servant beat him; now they use The current flowing from a fuse, Or put you on a softer diet; Your teeth fall out—but you'll be quiet; Forget you...

Page 26

Envelopment

The Spectator

'Nor even those who detest art will be averse to the presence of picture galleries near luxurious shops.' From the very first sentence of Mr. Stokes's new book, we are made...

All or Nothing

The Spectator

WHAT nonsense to say that man is reduced to insignificance by the galaxies! The stars are a common brightness in every eye. What 'out there' have you that does not correspond to...

Page 28

Genius as Critic

The Spectator

BY F. R. LEAVIS S INCE, in 1936, the year of its original publica- tion, I first read Phoenix* through, it has seemed to me immeasurably the finest body of criticism in...

Page 30

Her Husband

The Spectator

Comes home dull with coal-dust deliberately To grime the sink and foul towels and let her Learn with scrubbing brush and scrubbing board The stubborn character of money. And...

Rights and Wrongs

The Spectator

John Davidson: A Selection of his Poems. Edited by Maurice Lindsay. (Hutchinson, 25s.) NEVER mind other considerations, it is interest- ing to get a straight look at the work...

Page 31

British Worthies

The Spectator

Who's Who 1961. (Black, I30s.) I must - not pretend to have read every word of this book, but I have devoted a happy morning to it—a longer time than most reviewers of fiction...

Page 32

Despite his Cleverness

The Spectator

Joseph, 15s.) . MARY MCCARTHY has an anecdote about a young American girl engaged on a creative writing course who remarked, 'Mr. So-and-so is very pleased with my story, and...

Australians and Others

The Spectator

Poems. By A. D. Hope. (Hamish Hamilton, 15s.) William Empson Reading Selected Poems. (Listen Records, 39s. 9d.) A. D. HOPE is an important writer. Probably his best-known poem...

Page 34

The French Thing

The Spectator

BY JOHN COLEMAN T E T Mr. Heppenstall set the scene for us. I i To literary editors' offices there will already have gone out copies of a book jacketed in shiny black, white and...

Page 35

Senior Wambler

The Spectator

AFTER she had been. working with her on The Prince and the Showgirl, Sybil Thorndike said about Marilyn Monroe: On the set, I thought, surely she won't come over, she's so small...

Page 36

Two Views of Wythorne

The Spectator

THE publication of this book is something of an event. Mr. Osborn claims to have given us 'a new Tudor poet and the earliest "modern" autobiography in English.' (`Modern' is...

Explorer

The Spectator

Trampling new seas with filthy timbers, he Jotted down islands, speculated on Vestigial civilisations, ate strange fruits And called his o ffi cers Mister. When sails were...

Page 37

The Pound and the Dollar

The Spectator

By NICHOLAS DAVENPORT I HAVE the feeling that in the business and financial world international co-operation has received a big setback. Certainly, economic nationalism seems...

Page 38

Company Notes

The Spectator

L ORD CLITHEROE, chairman of The Mercantile Investment Trust, tells his 10,000 ordinal') shareholders that for the year ended January 3 1. J961, his company has had a successful...

Investment Notes

The Spectator

By CUSTOS T o many people's amazement the equity share boom goes on without interruption in both London and New York. Curiously, the Financial Times index keeps following the...

Page 40

Roundabout

The Spectator

Powder and Paint By KATHARINE WHITEHORN ONCE every five years a team of researchers hired by the magazine Woman goes out and asks some thousands of British women what...

Page 41

No Arterial Motives

The Spectator

By KENNETH J. ROBINSON A STATUS - SEEKER has been trying to buy a house in Suffolk for £30,000. No one, I am glad to say, can find him one. Silly Suffolk is not as silly as all...

Consuming Interest

The Spectator

Man's Estate By LESLIE ADRIAN Deliberate deception is confined to the rackety few on the margin of the profession, though even barefaced fraud is a tough charge to make stick,...

Page 42

Postscript . .

The Spectator

• IF it is true, as the GI than prophesies, that censorship of outgo press messages is to in Moscow, foreign jc nalists there will be dogs deprived of 't' fleas: an irritation...

'Cooking a decent meal in a bedsitter is not just

The Spectator

a matter of finding something that can be cooked over a single gas ring. It is a problem of finding somewhere to put down the fork while you take the lid oil the saucepan, and...