S even hundred police made 24 simultaneous raids around London, seizing half a ton of ammonium nitrate fertiliser in Hanwell, west London, arresting two men in Uxbridge, one in...

A s clay broke on 11 May 1941, Londoners could survey the devastation wrought by 100,000 incendiary bombs. Whole streets had been razed. More than L400 Londoners had been...

H as any prime minister been quite so insulated from Parliament and Cabinet? Blair's solo performance last week, as he flew from Madrid to Libya to Brussels with his plane-load...

PETER OBORNE A fter the 2001 general election massacre, a consensus swiftly established itself in the Conservative party. William Hague had fought on the wrong issues. Instead...

STEPHEN GLOVER fter the Hutton inquiry all fair-minded people should rally to the BBC. It is true that over the years the Corporation has sometimes displayed a bias in favour...

John Prescott is going to destroy large areas of England with new homes, even though more than 700,000 properties — enough to meet housing needs for the next four years —...

Bruce Anderson says that embarrassments over the European constitution may force Tony Blair to call an early election IF or nearly seven years, Tony Blair's caution was the...

Harry Mount laments the passing of an age when children had to recite Greek verbs before breakfast Ivy hatever you might think of The Passion of The Christ, at least Mel Gibson...

The Metropolitan Police have put up big posters on the Underground telling people what to do if they see a bag without an owner. 'Don't touch, check with other passengers,...

Brendan O'Neill is not as convinced as the Redgraves are by the tales of torture told by Guantanamo's freed British prisoners N one of us knows for certain what goes on inside...

Ross Clark warns that new rules on listed buildings could make it easier for the government to pull down ancient churches that stand in the way of airport extensions I ha), e...

Philip Pullman, author of the apparently anti-Christian His Dark Materials, and the Archbishop of Canterbury debated the significance of religion, and both enthusiastically...

Tom Walker says that Tony Blair is too busy doing global management to bother much about the consequences of Nato's humanitarian intervention in the Balkans F rom the kitchen...

David Lovibond is filled with sadness as he visits the wrecked landscapes that inspired a poet who loved old England and hated rich developers Inelosure like a Bonaparte let...

d I S T1 FILDES I have a question for the Bank of England's monetary policy committee: how do you attract a Missouri mule's attention? When the economists have quite worked out...

From Stuart Allison Sir: I was disappointed to read that the government's programme of creeping republicanism — the removal of the Crown from Treasury notepaper, the police...

From Chris Patten Sir: Frank Johnson (Shared opinion, 20 March) comments on my principal reason for not wishing to be considered as a candidate for the chairmanship of the BBC...

From Toby Young Sir: I feel some sympathy for Sheridan Morley (Letters, 27 March). Like him, I've been sacked from numerous journalistic posts and I've always had a very low...

From Angus Watson Sir: In your 20 March issue Andrew Kenny misses the point in the argument against Darwinism ('Down with superstition'). To question evolution theory on the one...

From Sheila Donaldson Sir: Obviously he doesn't realise it, but P.J. Kavanagh's review of The Catholic Revival in English Literature (Books, 20 March) reflects all the smug...

From Gerald Hitman Sir: I am intrigued that a man as able as Jeremy Clarke should have been unable to help Nick Griffin with a working definition of racism (`Britain's most...

From David M. Benda Sir: That the likes of Peter °borne should see a moral equivalence between the assassination of a vile terrorist and the killing of innocent civilians in a...

From Patrick Carden Sir: Following the Spanish bomb outrage, which had not occurred at the time of the writing/publication of Simon Jenkins's 13 March cover story on Mr Blair's...

PAUL JOHNSON I have been given a superb Thames & Hudson book, The Most Beautiful Libraries in the World, and browsing through it has prompted thoughts on this difficult...

FRANK JOHNSON W hat books, if any, important politicians read, as well as being of itself interesting, could also influence how they rule. In the late 1940s, it became known...

Have a toehold in both Paris and London, suggests Gerald Cadogan T he other day, a good friend asked me where he should look for a property investment. He has a gain that must...

U ntil 1994 we lived in Surrey. 'Surrey's not a county,' an Eton beak pointed out to my son, 'If s a suburb!' So, a writer-wife with no ties to London and a house-husband (me)...

Sally Gimson T he most alarming aspect of living in London, for many people, is the extortionate cost of renting or buying somewhere to live. On the open market, it is...

Sebastian Dekker U nless you want to break the law, incur a substantial fine Or, even worse, a prison sentence, you must be very cautious about trying to improve your home....

Raymond Carr FLOURISHING: LETTERS 1928-1946 by Isaiah Berlin, edited by Henry Hardy Chau°, 430, pp. 755, ISBN 070117420X J saiah Berlin was a much-loved friend and a dominant...

Jonathan Croall GIELGUD'S LETTERS edited by Richard Mangan Weidenfeld & Nicolson, £20, pp. 564, ISBN 0297829890 A. s in the theatre, so in his letters: John Gielgud was a man...

Piers Paul Read IN SEARCH OF A BEGINNING: MY LIFE WITH GRAHAM GREENE by Yvonne Cloetta, as told to MarieFrancoise Alain, translated from the French by Euan Cameron Bloomsbury,...

Eric Anderson I'm A TEACHER, GET ME OUT OF HERE by Francis Gilbert Short Books, £9.99, pp. 207, ISBN 1904095682 m y only experience of a tough inner-city school was on...

Antonia Fraser FIREWALL by Henning Mankell Harrill, £14.99, pp. 422, ISBN 1843431122 H enning Mankell, the Swedish crimewriter who is the creator of Inspector Kurt Wallender,...

Noel Malcolm THE DEVONSHIRE INHERITANCE: FIVE CENTURIES OF COLLECTING AT CHATSWORTH by Nicolas Barker Art Services International, £40, pp. 431, ISBN 0883971380, available from...

Isabel Colegate RATHCORMICK: A CHILDHOOD RECALLED by Homan Potterton Vintage, £7.99, pp. 303, ISBN 009946179X H ave we had enough Irish childhoods, lackadaisical days remote...

A. N. Wilson A CASE FOR RELIGION by Keith Ward Oneworld Publications. 185 Banbuty Road, Oxford 0X2 7AR, Tel: 01865 310597, 416.99, pp. 246, ISBN 1851683372 T his is a brave...

George St. Andrews THE CAMBRIDGE DICTIONARY OF ENGLISH PLACE NAMES edited by Victor Watts CUP, ,f175, pp. 713, ISBN 0521362091 W ho would have thought of l {arrow as 'the...

Simon Sebag Montefiore SHOSTAKOVICH AND STALIN: THE EXTRAORDINARY RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE GREAT COMPOSER AND THE BRUTAL DICTATOR by Solomon Volkov Little, Brown, £14.99, pp....

Michael Beloff MY BRIEF CAREER: THE TRIALS OF A YOUNG LAWYER by Harry Mount Short Books, 0.99. pp. 170, ISBN 1904095690 T his is a sad little story of the author's antnis...

Tony Geraghty SOLDIER FIVE by Mike Coburn Mainstream, £17.99, pp. 316, ISBN 1840188669 T he epic survival story of the SAS patrol known as Bravo Two Zero during the first Gulf...

Andrew Barrow SNOBS by Julian Fellowes Weidenfeld, £12.99, pp. 265, ISBN 0297848763 T his provocative, titillating and seductive novel is about upperclass affectations and...

Peter Phillips explains how he has become doubly obsessed: with film as well as music H ave you ever rubbed shoulders with musicians and thought them dull — because they are...

Andrew Lambirth Heaven on Earth: Art from Islamic Lands The Hermitage Rooms, Somerset House, Courtauld Institute of Art, until 22 August A i F t i other successful exhibition...

Tom Rosenthal Jean Arp: L'invention de la forme Pubis des Beaux-Arts, Brussels, until 6 June B russels, with its faintly schizophrenic bilingual culture, seems the perfect...

Toby Young Festen Almeida The Dark Donmar Hurricane Arts A t a last, a good play! Festen, a stage daptation of the Danish film of the same name, is among the two or three best...

Michael Tanner Sosarme Royal College of Music Vanda Bloomsbury Theatre Elor four out of every five Handel operas I see I do my best to persuade myself of and report on their...

Ursula Buchan W hen I was a child, I pestered my mother to take us to Longleat. In the end she agreed, pleased perhaps to think that I was developing a precocious interest in...

Mark Steyn Monster 18. selected cinemas I n 1943, the first musical with an 'antihero', Rodgers and Hart's Pal Joey, opened on Broadway. 'Although it is expertly done,' wrote...

Michael Vestey M ore than a year after the war against Iraq was launched, the World Service and Radio Four have been broadcasting programmes about the extraordinary diplomacy...

James Delingpole S hy people are evil. I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of shy people I actually like. Mostly I agree with my (shy) friend Hugh Massingberd's...

Talu New York M y house is being renovated by a team of Chinese men who speak no English and who smoke non-stop. I suppose people do not say good morning in China, or perhaps...

Jeremy Clarke B oth of our upright vacuum cleaners broke down last week. I found a repair shop in Yellow Pages and took them along, and who should be behind the counter but...

Petronella Wyatt W hy do we tip taxi-drivers? I mean why do we really? We don't tip traindrivers, or bus-drivers, or minicab-drivers or airline pilots. So why do we always...

FRANK KEATING I t is a relief, I suppose, that the most momentous English football fixture so far this year does not feature Manchester United. Next Tuesday at Highbury,...

Several friends living overseas have indicated that they will be coming to England this mourner and that they would like to pay us a visit. However, since seeing them last,...