`No chance of a wrongful arrest is there, officer?' M r Michael Portillo, when he was Chief Secretary to the Treasury, wrote a stiff letter to Mr Michael Heseltine, the...

The Spectator, 56 Doughty Street, London WC1N 2LL Telephone: 071-405 1706; Telex 27124; Fax 071-242 0603 WHO ARE THE MASTERS? F rom Beaumarchais to Bogarde, litera- ture and...

Mr Heseltine must retaliate by putting a Frenchman on the moon BORIS JOHNSON Before Mr Portillo's pungent demand that Mr Heseltine abandon the DTI's fund- ing for space...

T he sales are now upon us, causing sat- isfaction to bargain-hunters, and a certain amount of chagrin to those other shoppers who find the interior of their favourite store...

Put up the interest rates, you pasty-faced coward AUBERON WAUGH I n the event of anything terrible happen- ing to nice Mr Major, I have usually thought of Kenneth Clarke as...

Alasdair Palmer reveals the techniques of terror and evasion used by the Social Services in their rush to identify child-abusers `WHENEVER I dream, it's always about having my...

George Alagiah confronts the moral hazards of reporting deaths, instead of saving lives, in Rwanda Goma, ZairelRwanda border IT WAS THE first time in over a week that we had...

Twenty years ago the Watergate affair reached its climax. The Clintons may feel differently about it now, argues Michael Moran Washington IT IS interesting to imagine what...

HERE ARE some odds and ends which I hesitate to call a cabinet of curiosities. `What does grimpen mean, as in "Grimpen Mire"?' a reader asks. Well, I don't know. The Grimpen...

Richard Dawkins believes that science should be on the religious education syllabus in schools I RECENTLY took part in a live radio dis- cussion — The Moral Maze — on...

In the latest in our series on English counties, Hugh Massingberd dispels the myths about Lincolnshire AH, Lincolnshire,' King George III is sup- posed to have exclaimed on...

persist.. . LAST WEEK I went up to a young patient in the ward who was sobbing qui- etly to herself in her bed, and asked her what was wrong. She had taken too many tablets in...

When the nut-cutlet brigade start snapping at the heels of Achilles PAUL JOHNSON O nce you look at it in detail, the Guardian's campaign against senior com- manders in our...

Sir: Henry Porter is puzzled that anyone can feel strongly enough about food, and especially cheese, to wish to write about it (`Whining and dining', 23 July). His is a...

Sir: The posthumous rehabilitation of that loosely associated group of largely Bald- winesque Conservatives, who were not fas- cist fellow-travellers but English patriots...

12 Months 6 Months UK 0 £80.00 0 £41.00 Europe (airmail) 0 f91.00 0 f46.00 USA Airspeed 0 US$130 0 US$66.00 USA Airmail 0 US$175 0 US$88 Rest of Airmail 0 £111.00 0 f55.50 World...

Sir: The bombing of Dresden was certainly a strategic imperative as Mr Caldwell states (Letters, 30 July). But it was neither Eisen- hower, nor Harris, nor Churchill who origi-...

Sir: I agree entirely, as I generally do, with all Nigel Nicolson has to say on music and noise (Arts, 16 July), but when he said that no Englishman has shouted 'hurrah' for the...

Sir: While grateful for Rupert Chris- tiansen's timely interview with the Con- troller of Radio Three (Arts, 23 July), I rather wish he had challenged Nicholas Kenyon's...

Sir: Thank you for detailing Lord Rennell's 3...Nxe4? when playing the Petroff Defence in The Spectator chess match between the House of Lords and the House of Com- mons (Chess,...

Sir: Could the normally robust Richard Lit- tlejohn be turning into an over-sensitive luwie now he is now on local television? As the 'young man in the corduroy suit' `You'll be...

An end as bitter as wormwood James Buchan LOVE AND HATRED: THE STORMY MARRIAGE OF LEO AND SONYA TOLSTOY by William L. Shirer Aurum Press, £16.95, pp.400 A mong the photographs...

Alan Judd GRAHAM GREENE: THE MAN WITHIN by Michael Shelden Heinemann, £20, pp. 480 T his revealing and comprehensive account, the first to embrace the whole of Greene's busy...

Allan Massie TITO AND THE RISE AND FALL OF YUGOSLAVIA by Richard West Sinclair - Stevenson, £20, pp. 436 TITO by Jasper Ridley Constable, £20, pp. 495 T wo biographies of Tito...

Robert Kee VOICES IN IRELAND: A TRAVELLER'S LITERARY COMPANION by P. J. Kavanagh John Murray, £19.99, pp. 354 T his book is full of voices conjured up by a literary Prospero...

Anne Chisholm JUGGLING T he best-loved English novels have never been those in which the author demonstrates tremendous cleverness. In writing, as in much else, we are easily...

Charles Saumarez Smith THE PALLADIAN REVIVAL: LORD BURLINGTON, HIS VILLA AND GARDEN AT CHISWICK by John Harris Yale, £40, pp. 280 I wasn't — sadly — able to attend the opening...

Francis Wheen I REACH FOR THE STARS: AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY by Barbara Cartland Robson Books, f14.95, pp. 197 W e know Barbara Cartland the romantic novelist. But Barbara Cartland...

Harriet Waugh S ara Paretsky's Polish American female private eye, V. I. Warshawski was becom- ing a disagreeable bore in her last novel, Guardian Angel, a turgid tale of doggy...

John Campbell VALUES: COLLAPSE AND CURE by Lord Hailsham HarperCollins, .£12.99, pp. 177 E ighteen months ago Lord Hailsham was depressed. Nearing the end of a long, passionate...

A Vintage Subscription Offer Give a Spectator gift subscription to a valued friend or relative, and we will give you a gift in return - a bottle of Moet & Chandon 1986 Vintage...

Pop music Rock stuck in the Stone Age Marcus Berkmann finds the old stars still hold centre stage but they are not a pretty sight T he Rolling Stones are back again, drag-...

The Romantic Spirit in German Art 1790 — 1990 (Royal Scottish Academy and the Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh, till 7 September) William Gillies Watercolours of Scotland...

The Card (Open Air, Regents Park) Let's Do It (Chichester Festival Theatre) The Lady from the Sea (Lyric, Hammersmith) Sail away to the park Sheridan Morley N at since Tommy...

Getting Even With Dad (PG', selected cinemas) North (PG', selected cinemas) Kiddie flicks Mark Steyn S ummer means movie moppets, and all a grown-up star can do is try and...

Seventh heaven Taki E xcept for the occasional blowing up of one's yacht, July in London has been a grand time. This is the first time in more than 20 years that I've been...

A shaggy dog story Ian Hislop Who's there? O.J. O.J. who? Congratulations you're on Jury Service. When I was told this joke I was not sure who O.J. Simpson was and would...

o noble English Nigel Nicolson A n American visitor once said to me that he thought London the most civilized city in the world because it was the only place where a man could...

Not in front of the nurses Jeffrey Bernard Unhappiness is one of the best kept secrets in the world although sometimes the truth is blurted out by people having nervous...

this new establishment is that of the chap who owns it rather than the one whose food is eaten in it is a sign that the chef, whose place in society seemed in the Eighties and...

CHESS I c,.01 1 0A111 ill SPAIN'S FINEST CAVA Comet Korchnoi Raymond Keene VICTOR KORCHNOI, the veteran Soviet defector, resident for the past couple of decades in...

COMPETITION ISLE. OF I g RA 51,41. MAU KOTallilSil JURA, SALL! VALI SCOICH WS Chunnel vision Jaspistos IN COMPETITION NO. 1841 you were invited to write a poem giving a...

`Happiness is a list ticked off,' said Mrs Thatcher — an unusual definition of an elusive concept. You are invited to write a poem (maximum 16 lines) beginning `Happiness is...

PORT CROSSWORD GRAHAM'S PORT A first prize of £25 and a bottle of Graham's Malvedos 1479 Vintage Port for the first correct solution opened on 22 August, with two runners-up...

The unclued across lights are LAWS ; four of the unclued down lights are ORDERS, and the fifth is 16D: law and order. First prize: John Coleby, Buckley, Clwyd; Runners-up: S....

In defence of Aggers Frank Keating AND SO TO Leeds, with England really up against it. No one more so than Raymond Illingworth in his own backyard. The chair- man of selectors...

the whole point of a drinks party is to meet as many people as possible. I therefore like occa- sionally to glance over the shoulder of who- ever I am talking to in order to...