T HE New Year brings a dubious economic prospect. We must therefore be thankful that we have at the Treasury a Chancellor of the Exchequer who not only knows his job, but has...

degree of frost, and Britain wilted. Trains were stopped, planes were grounded, tempers were frayed, sport was can- celled. power stations were overloaded, car workers were laid...

T tHE continuing refusal of the British Govern- ment to recognise the revolutionary govern- ment in the Yemen is embarrassing. Recognition was originally withheld because it was...

T HE true story of events in the past few days in the Congo has not yet emerged. Amid the jumble of accusations and counter-accusations, and the possible UN censorship of...

P RESIDENT KENNEDY'S New Year resolution to press on with policies designed to solve the problems of the cold war regardless of the feelings of his allies is certainly logical...

By HEDLEY BULL R n ANKE once defined a great power as one that can maintain itself against all others, even when they are united; in effect, as a power that can dispense with...

From DARSIE GILLIE PARIS I HIS has been Charles de Gaulle's peak year, in which he rose from a situation very near defeat to one very like triumph—in external as well as in...

From JAMES F. RIDGEWAY NEW YORK T HE next Congress will include three Demo- crats from California who received active support from peace groups in their campaigns to win House...

FAIRLIE By HENRY 1 HE most important domestic political fact in the past year has been the emergence of Mr. Hugh Gaitskell as the accepted alternative Prime Minister and,...

By BRIAN BEHAN He advanced us £100 on the strict under- standing that every penny profit would be divided equally in our coop. Of course, of Course, we murmured, feeling like...

It is rather curious that such passionate in- terest should be displayed in the revelations of volume after volume of documents from the German Foreign Office archives. I should...

pleasures of the old. Among the more popular events in the eighteenth century was the daily baiting of bulls in the city squares. The bulls, taken from the slaughterhouse, were...

Venice is determined to be in the news. The exhibition here at the RIBA is not the only part of the drive for publicity. Italia Nostra is also Proposing that visitors to Venice...

H mom( will will always find it remarkable that when, after 1945, the West had to face a Communist challenge whose nature and size Were then unknown to it, the leaders of the...

would be interested to know upon what evidence Mr. Endymion Wilkinson bases his asser- tion that Gordonstoun ' step by step breaks a boy ' s ties with the outside world —...

The Mexican Ambas■ador, Proj. F. Pierce Dickens and the Critics Dr. F. R. Leavis Pist ol - Packing Nicolas Walter Black Boomerang C. E. Stevens Gor donstoun Mrs. Clifford...

Dead ' in last week ' s Spectator, in which the case is argued for the de- L elo Pment. of Latin American studies in this country. M. Cohen is well known to academic circles and...

SIR,—Mr. Peter Fison opens a review in your last week ' s issue by telling your readers that 'Dr Leavis, of course, doesn ' t like Dickens. ' What information Mr. Fison is...

SIR,—While members of Delmer ' s team will be grateful to your reviewer (December 14, 1962), one of them would like to get the record straight, as no copies are extant of what...

SIR,—In his eagerness to prove my 'eagerness to equate democratic and Communist societies, ' David Rees forgot to read my letter. I equated 'democratic ' and Communist (and...

SIR. —How does Charles Osborne come to the con- clusion that I am 'an agnostic yearning for the cross'? Presumably by one of the current processes of religious double-think....

Face to Face By NE VILE WALLIS ABOUT 160,000 people rounded London's windiest corner last year and entered the National Portrait Gallery. A surpris- ingly large number that,...

Whoops ! By CLIVE BARNES THE other day, Alan Brien, talking on the BBC, suggested that classical ballet was the most fragile of arts, always awaiting demolition from the ence...

SIR,—Donald Horne's reasonably fair analysis of Australia is not quite accurate on two counts. There is some political rethinking of the White Australia policy and much of it...

Off Season By BAMBER GASCOIGNE Squat Betty. (Royal Court.)— Three at Nine. (New Arts.) The Blue Bird. (Lyric, Hammersmith.) NOTHING very theatrical has happened in the seven...

Charity Viewing By CLIFFORD HANLEY THE season of goodwill, which lasts practically for ever in Scotland, always comes with threatening undertones. There is something about an...

Stripping By ISABEL QUIGLY MUSICALS are much more theatrical than most films, in the sense that they need you taking part. They may be spec- tacular, and go in for every kind...

By JOHN SIMON W I-LAT distinguishes the current New York theatrical season so far is not the numerous closings after record short runs (though the fact that so many . plays had...

Conkers now have fallen hard, Asphalt's blacker in back yard, Virginities too lightly lost Have made the losers count the cost, Lost behind young April trees Have forced the...

James's Little Tarts Y TONY 'FANNER H ERE is the second batch* of James's 'little tarts,' as he chose to call his short stories, as opposed to the 'beef and potatoes' of his...

Of Ships and Men. By Alan Villiers. (Newnes, 30s.) EVEN if the seas make you puke, and you abhor anthologies, you may without much trepidation embark with Alan Villiers. Yet...

A History of the Weimar Republic. By Erich Eyck. (Harvard and O.U.P., 3 gns.) THE fall of the Spanish Republic has commonly been described as the classic case of democratic...

IN the summer of 1670, hunting at Chambord, I °Ws XIV commanded a diversion for his court. He proposed to his masters of music and revels a ballet exhibiting Turkish dress and...

The Footballer's Companion. Edited by Brian Glanville. (Eyre and Spottiswoode, 25s:) THE literature of football is unmarked by the infinitely tedious belle-lettrism that is the...

The Isle of Cats. By John Symonds. Illustrated by Gerard Hoffnung. (Dobson, 10s. 6d.) Mr. Twink and the Cat Thief. By Fred Hurt. Illustrated by Nina Scott Langley. (Epworth...

HOW to Make your Fortune on the Stock Ex- rhange. By Vivian Ellis. (Muller, 12s. 6d.) ONE would not wish to revive the ill-omened at- mosphere of 1929 in the United States, when...

By NICHOLAS DAVENPORT BELlEVE it or not, I had just written a piece of advice to Mr. Maudling telling him that he must immediately re- duce the remaining high rates of purchase...

By LOTHBURY P RELIMINARY figures already received fro Anglo Auto Finance are followed by an excellent and full report from the chairman an managing director, Mr. Julian S....

By CUSTOS HE forecasters are being beastly to the I edged market and kind to select groups of equity shares for the coming year. Certainly no one would expect gilt-edged...

Fruits de Wier By ELIZABETH DAVID WINKLES and whelks, cockles and oysters, spider crabs, scallops, shrimps, langoustines, mussels, prawns, the little clams known in France as...

By LESLIE ADRIAN I COMPLAINED here some months ago about the astonishing variations one gets in estimates • from building contrac- tors for the same job and congratulated my-...