On the face of it there is no reason why the pro-Marketeers should be depressed with the progress of the referendum campaign so far: the massive and uncritical support which...

Sir: In the Spectator I find Mr M. I. Becket falling upon me, with what Malory would have called great random, for a parenthesis about Mrs Thatcher's sincerity. I honestly can't...

both got our banner wrong. It read "Communists for Europe." As for Chairman Mao's support for the EEC, it is likely that our value as a counterweight to the Soviets had more to...

I was shocked when a Conservative Association deputy chairman told me that his party had no intention of encouraging discussion of the Common Market issue betause, in his words,...

Sir: Although not quite sharing your evangelical fervour on some issues, such as the EEC, I usually find that your editorial line is stimulating. reasoned and not normally far...

you on your unqualified editorial condemnation (May 23) of the abominable behaviour' of the US Administration in relation to the ms Mayaguez, welcomed by the Times, to its...

Sir: Thank you for giving space to the impending bookless plight of Bucks. Mr Crosland has stated this week that the country receives a Rate Support Grant of 66 per cent. In...

From the Dean of St Paul's Sir: In the article over my name on May 24 a serious omission has occurred. I quoted the last two lines of Paradise Regained which read: "... he...

Conspiracy in the Civil Service Patrick Cosgrave It would be disputed neither by pronor by anti-Marketeers that the question of whether or not Britain remains a member of the...

My friend Tony Howard of the New Statesman needs a severe scolding for catching me with one of his magazine covers a week or two ago. Angela Davis's name, with a list of others,...

Exhaustive previewing at the Academy's Summer Exhibition, the National Portrait Gallery and the Chelsea Flower Show have failed to enlighten me on the social importance of being...

'Tis impossible to escape the rumours and whispers around the Town that, the people's decision on the Great Entanglement having been safely arrived at, Master T. Benn will...

Waspe The guest appearances of Galina and Valery Panov with Festival Ballet have not been all , sWeetness and light. The Russian dancers had decidedly strong views on what they...

I hear that Philip Agee's controversial account of the CIA, Inside the Company, has -at last found an American publisher. The book appeared in Britain as a Penguin earlier this...

As I see it A number of prominent citizens here give their answers to a question which The Spectator has put to them — "What is your principle reason for voting 'No' in the...

The grand illusion Gerald Frost No crystal ball is required to predict that one Friday morning fairly soon — the official unemployment figures being published by tradition on...

Pandora's TV box Roy Macnab During the past few weeks South Africans, white and black, have ben going through a riveting experience. They've been watching television — South...

From a man who when he was barely sixteen years of age found himself in a prison cell in Frankfurt, and subsequently in a concentration camp for distributing leaflets against...

Gillian Freeman Courtesans of the 'Italian Renaissance Georgina Masson (Seeker and Warburg £4.50) A Place for Pleasure G. L. Simons (Harwood-Smart Publishing £3.95) Mankoff's...

Spirit of the age Thomas Corbishley S3 Pope John XXIII Paul Johnson (Hutchinson £3.50) One of the titles applied to the Pope is that of Summus Pontifex, Sovereign Pontiff. It...

Leo Abse Exorcism Martin Ebon (Cassell £3.50) The Powers of Evil Richard Cavendish (Routledge and Kegan Paul 15.95) It would be extravagant of me to claim that some of my...

Alan Brien Jesus Now Malachi Martin (Collins U.25). Jesus Who Became Christ Peter De Rosa (Collins £3.50) Did Jesus Exist? G. A. Wells (Elek 0.80) Reviewing books about Jesus...

Who dat out dere? Benny Green Why I am Not a Christian Bertrand Russell (Unwin Books £1.00). It seems to be that when a man, having through no choice of his own, been born in...

Resourceful Peter Ackroyd Unnatural Heir David Stuart Leslie (Macdonald and Jane's £3.25) The Carfitt Crisis J. B. Priestley (Heinemann £2.90) A novel which has, on its...

Change and decay Bill Grundy "Change arid decay/In all around I see/0 Thou, who changest not/Abide with me". This jolly little hymn, sung yearly at every Cup Final until this...

The great god John Linklater Brainwashing is a medically authenticated reality. It consists of purging, or clearing the conscious mind of established ideas by powerful and...

The name game Philip Kleinman Lawrence Durrell wrote a short but interesting letter to the Observer the other day. It read as follows: "One of your reviewers, in mentioning...

Rediscovery Martin Sullivan The New Testament makes it quite clear that in most matters Christ's -immediate disciples, i.e., the Twelve, either misunderstood Him or could not...

Birds and plants Denis Wood Now (writing at the beginning of May) magpies are building in our Scots pines again this year. They are busy collecting wet turfy mud from the edge...

Unmade jig-saw Kenneth Robinson Stavisky. Director: Alan Resnais Stars: Jean-Paul Belmondo, Anny Duperey 'A' Curzon (120 minutes). Stavisky is the former name of a crook...

Rodney Milnes The fact that the three operas 'mounted during the past fortnight Were all, give or take a few months, written within the last fifty years does not prove,...

On putting the clock forward—II Nicholas Davenport Before any more Americans tell us that we are 'drifting towards a condition of ungovernability' or 'sleep-walking into a...

Booming Britain Bernard Hollowood Are we making a song and dance about nothing? 'Is the economic crisis as serious as..the newspapers and politicians • Would have us believe?...

The row Over the British Steel Corporation is not yet over; or rather the argument will flare up again. Part of the reason is that despite what may have been the ostensible...