expensively refurbished M r Sam Younger, the chairman of the Electoral Commission, commenting on the question to be posed in a referendum on joining the euro, said, Tin sure it...

T ermites who laid waste to religious houses in 18th-century Brazil could expect more merciful treatment than a visit from the Rentokil man. In Maranhao in 1709, a group of the...

J oan Rivers is at full wattage. The show is flying. Her capacity audience is sobbing with laughter. She has skewered Cher, Filipinos, Hillary Clinton. And then, abruptly, she...

PETER OBORNE T his political year was only ever going to be about three things. First, the Comprehensive Spending Review, signalling the conversion of New Labour into a...

on the editor of the Daily Mirror? STEPHEN GLOVER M uch ink has been spilt over the abortive price war between the Daily Mirror and the Sun. which, as I suggested would be the...

The Guardian calls it a national scandal but even top Labour figures are doing it. Rachel Johnson on the amazing ubiquity of private tuition MY eight-year-old daughter...

I'M glad all the football is over, but a legacy of the World Cup, according to the BBC, is that the word hooligan has passed into Japanese with the meaning merely of 'football...

Simon Heifer finds lain Duncan Smith convinced that the Tories can win the trust of the nation THE Leader of Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition looks intently at me across the...

Black magic is illegal in Zambia, says Hugh Russell, but there's a lot of juju about. The results can be embarrassingly painful Lusaka THE Zambia Copperbelt police chief...

the name of Oleg Gordievsky was not, in fact, from him.

Are the blond, blue-eyed Afghans descended from Alexander the Great's soldiers? Matthew Leeming is determined to find out LAST summer I went on holiday to Afghanistan. I had...

NATURE, in her infinite wisdom and mercy, has decreed that a goodly proportion of mankind should be born ugly: but that, of course, has not in the least discouraged mankind from...

Fat people aren't victims, says Tania Kindersley. They're just fat, and it's time they were urged to shape up WE are all vast now. Columnists, doctors, cross-bench committees...

AT the Austrian Grand Prix last month, the Ferrari driver Rubens Barrichello was ordered to pull over and let his world champion team-mate Michael Schumacher win. This caused...

John Littlewood says that British share prices are weak because Labour loves regulations and hates profits age of hero worship. Why not harness that power in a campaign for...

A weekly survey of the things our rulers want to prohibit WITH stock markets collapsing around her, taking our pensions with them, one might imagine that the Trade and Industry...

PAUL JOHNSON W hen I am looking at the poultry in Somerset, I am not idle. I am thinking. The three main species — ducks, geese and chickens, of various kinds — often fight...

From Mr Julian Filochowski Sir: Your commentary (Leading article, 29 June) on the Catholic Fund for Overseas Development's policy positions was wide of the mark, Cafod's demand...

From Mr J. Morrell Sir: Katie Grant's article ('Democracy: who needs it?', 29 June) on Turkmenistan is being passed around online Central Asian groups with queries as to whether...

From The Rt Hon. Lord Tebbit Sir: Sarfraz Manzoor ( - England, my England', 29 June), a television journalist I regard highly, has long been welcome in Britain. May I also...

From Mr Francis Wheen Sir: Simon Heffer's robust defence of Prince Michael of Kent CA prince among men', 29 June) is marred only by his assertion that the prince's critics are...

From His Excellency Ghazi Algosaibi Sir: In his most recent hilarious-as-usual masterpiece, Mark Steyn (Dust bin', 29 June) refers, directly and indirectly, three times to Osama...

From Mr Robert Davies Sir: James Delingpole's barrack-room lawyer (Arts, 29 June) reminds me of an incident in Italy in 1943. The US general George Patton was inspecting a...

From Mr James Young Sir: Stephen Glover in his excellent piece on Fleet Street ('Power without responsibility', 29 June) mentions the Telegraph's watering-hole. the King and...

ATTHENk PARRIS T he answer to the question 'Why do US presidents throw their weight around?' is the same as the answer to the question 'Why do dogs lick their balls?' Because...

CHRISTOPHER FILDES W hat a world-beating bezzle. It will go straight into the textbooks. Professors of economics will preach from it, to pupils who will have forgotten their...

Philip Hensher LEOPARDS IN THE TEMPLE by Morris Dickstein Harvard, £10.95, pp. 242, ISBN 0674006049 A merican culture and American polity exist in an uneasy relationship....

Trevor McDonald SERIOUS by John McEwen Lit/c, Brown, £17.99, pp. 346, ISBN 0316859869 T his is a racy account of a turbulent odyssey from one-time tennis genius and foulmouthed...

Jonathan Mirsky K: THE ART OF LOVE by Hong Ying, translated by Nicky Harmon and Henry Zhao Marion Boyars, £9.99, pp. 252, ISBN 0714530727 A s China was adopting Leninist...

Digby Anderson IN THE DEVIL'S GARDEN: A SINFUL HISTORY OF FORBIDDEN FOOD by Stewart Lee Allen Canongam £14.99, pp. 315, ISBN 1841952222 M r Allen is quite the traveller. He...

Gone are the days of youth No more returning. This is the simple truth, No point in yearning. First it's the eyes that go, Then it's the knees; Then comes the cruellest blow,...

on a pedestal Christopher Woodward THE ARCHITECT AND HIS WIFE by Jane Ridley Chatto, £25, pp. 488, ISBN 0701172010 S ome years ago Jane Ridley (with her mother Clayre Percy)...

Timothy Mo FRAGRANT HARBOUR by John Lanchester Faber, £16.99, pp. 300, ISBN 0576201768 H ong Kong is the elephants' graveyard of novelists, the last resort when they can...

Jonathan Cecil STRAIGHT FACE by Nigel Hawthorne Hodder, £18.99, pp. 339, ISBN 0340769424 I n 1968 I appeared in my first radio play. It was a fustian historical piece peppered...

Robert Adam on why he believes Ken Livingstone wants more skyscrapers in London A bout a year ago Ken Livingstone said that he would like to see 15 new skyscrapers in London....

Gilbert & George: The Dirty Words Pictures, 1977 (Serpentine Gallery, till 1 September) Grim outlook Martin Gayford A few years ago, during an interview, George of Gilbert &...

Renaissance and Baroque Bronzes from the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge (Daniel Katz Gallery, 59 Jermyn Street, London SW!, till 19 July) Love of virtuosity Bruce Boucher M...

Euryanthe (Glyndebourne) The Silver Tassie (Coliseum) Solemnity of Weber Michael Tanner E veryone wishes Euryanthe well, but it is an opera that simply refuses to oblige. Not...

Take Me Out (Donmar Warehouse) Coming out Toby Young I 've been a theatre critic for only nine months so perhaps I'm not qualified to make this judgment, but contemporary...

Rosemary Clooney Mark Steyn I t's slightly unsettling to think that these days Rosemary Clooney is best known as George Clooney's aunt. But then George's dad, Nick Clooney, a...

Cultural divide Marcus Berkmann E ven in this time of great national pride, when the Cross of St George adorns every Irish pub and Chinese takeaway, and barely a third of the...

The Wimbledon experience Simon Hoggart T he problem isn't really dumbing down, it's broadening out. The BBC doesn't think we're all stupid; it just believes that we can't...

On wolves and saints Michael Vestey W hen I returned a call to BBC Television's Breakfast I was asked to be in Wembley the following morning to say why I hated football; it...

I should have plunged Robin Oakley S ome things in life give one a special, familiar pleasure: slipping into a slightly battered old pair of suede shoes, eating baked beans on...

Playing the game Taki L et me quote you a passage from a book of a second world war battle by Antony Beevor: The Greek garrisons on the Metaxas line fought with great...

Intimate discussions Jeremy Clarke I wasn't looking forward to visit six. Visits one to five of the clinical trial to test the relative merits of two rival anti-impotence...

Tunes for the Tories Petronella Wyatt T he other day my singing teacher, Kate, took me to see a show at the King's Head pub in Islington, which has a small theatre. The...

THANK YOU so much for your incredible response to Whichever?, the first ever non-subscription-only magazine for people who don't give a stuff about value for money and just want...

Michael Henderson NO matter how snootily some people may dismiss Wimbledon, the annual festival of tennis on grass remains a magnificent event. You can grumble about the cliché...

Q. When the local elections are due I always receive a visit from a councillor who speaks for himself or the colleague due for re-election. He is a charming man and we have...