SHEIK-DOWN THE first rule of markets is that everyone should play by the same rules. 'The second rule of the game is that if you lose you lose. You don't take away the ball....

SPEGIAI7OR I I The Spectator, 56 Doughty Street, London WC1N 2LL Telephone 01-405 1706; Telex 27124; Fax 242 0603 MRS THATCHER'S GREENHOUSE The jet that took the British...

_ POLITI CS_ Mr Kinnock prepares for a landslide victory over the Labour Party NOEL MALCOLM Blackpool B ig fleas have little fleas, On their backs to bite 'em.... Mrs...

POLAND RINGS IN THE OLD Timothy Garton Ash finds that a leaked memorandum reveals the thinking of Poland's new Prime Minister POLAND has a new Prime Minister, Mr Mieczyslaw...

THE SPECTATOR FOR POLAND I Timothy Garton Ash writes: POLAND and Solidarity are in the headlines again. Mrs Thatcher is due to pay an official visit to Poland, the first...

CONFERENCE TRICKS Richard Kelly argues that Conservative conferences have an unsuspected influence THE Tory conference has not been taken very seriously by students of...

SACHEVERELL SITMWELL Victoria Glendinning remembers the shyest of the 'deleterious trio', who died last week 'VERY soon we shall be left to ourselves - our generation. I...

Burns roams 'THE Chancellor's speech' (says Sir Terence Burns, his chief economic adviser) is written on the assumption that the figures are right.' Yes, but which figures?...

Home thoughts. .. HOME thoughts from Berlin, from an IMF party at night. A few of us had walked out onto a balcony which commanded a view over the Wall. Beyond it stretched a...

What markets know THE Court of Appeal has reserved judgment in the leading case of Brian Fisher, who, you may recall, was acquitted of insider trading on the grounds that he...

CITY AND SUBURBAN Arsenal 3, Dalai Lama 2: Kuwait 0, BP 1 (pen.) this league needs new rules CHRISTOPHER FILDES Goodbye to the notion that mergers are judged by the test of...

. . . from abroad . . . AND a sad perception. When a student throws an egg at a banker, if your instinct puts you on the side of the banker, you are, irretrievably, middle aged.

THE ECONOMY Travelling at 70 mph, with the hairpin bends ahead JOCK BRUCE-GARDYNE The annual challenge match with the foils between Nigel Lawson (Fleet Street Irregulars) and...

Sir: Further to Christopher Booker's en- quiry into the return of the cossacks. I worked at the War Office (Civil Affairs) after the war - we had charge of thousands of...

I Sir: May I correct a misprint in my article 'The conspiracy that never was'. The letter defining a 'Soviet citizen' was not sent to AFHQ on 6 March 1945, but by AFHQ to all...

Shoot first Sir: In his lucid summing-up of the Gibraltar inquest (Another voice, I October), Mr-Zeal-for-Procedure Waugh overlooks two points. Only the SAS had special...

Sir: Your diarist, Nirad C. Chaudhuri (Diary, 24 September 1988) misses the point entirely about the IRA being soldiers. The IRA are absolutely convinced they are soldiers...

Loyal address Sir: I was happy to be reminded. by Steven Runciman (Books. 24 September) of Queen Marie of Romania. In 1921. my mother and I stayed at the (Cotreceni, her palace...

L E T T E R S Cossack handovers Sir: I have read with interest Christopher Booker's article 'The conspiracy that never was' (24 September), and particularly the part dealing...

Bar whine Sir: On 13 August (Leading article) you said of the British, 'we are wonderful at invention, hopeless at taking advantage of it'; the same theory was expressed by...

Screening Mrs Thatcher Sir: Richard Ingrams's review of Michael Cockerell's book Live from Number 10 (Books, 24 September) includes a suggestion that the BBC deliberately...

All hail, Cawdor Sir: Please recruit Lord Cawdor ('Stately) homage', 3 September) immediately as a regular contributor. Let no compunctious visitings shake his fell purpose,...

A brigadier writes Sir: Cyril Ray (Letters, 1 October) is still in error. A 'salvo' is a number of guns firing at the same moment. Salutes are generally fired as one gun after...

Glorious Macaulay Sir: The nun who taught Melanie McDonagh history ('What the nuns taught me', 30 July) would in fact have found quite a lot of common ground with Lord...

Gentle customs of an Italian matriarchy Anita Brookner THE LOST FATHER by Marina Warner Chanto & Windus, fl 1. 95, pp. 280 The hidden agenda in Marina Warner's substantial,...

How nice to see her again Isabel Colegate THE LIFE OF A PROVINCIAL LADY: A STUDY OF E. M. DELAFIELD AND HER WORKS by Violet Powell Heinemann, f 12.95, pp. g90 The Diary of a...

Lying beneath the surface David Rollow THE LYRE OF ORPHEUS by Robertson Davies Viking, f£.195, pp.472 Reading a novel by Robertson Davies is like dreaming someone else's...

Nicarchos, XI, 82 Adapted from the Greek Anthology Sebastian Overate, the media athlete, once took part in a long race with five other competitors. Wonderful to relatehe came...

A thousand pages in thy sight... Cressida Connolly KING LUDD by Andrew Sinclair lHodder &t Siougton, dun. 95. pp.352 1kndrew Sinclair is nothing if not prolific. The...

Mind in the Waters 'This is the mind I have always believed existed somewhere' - Joan McIntyre The mystery of it is we do recognise it from somewhere - from the womb perhaps,...

The decline of the English novel D. J. Taylor It is an unquestionable fact that the English don't read serious books. They never have done and critics have been complaining...

Theatre The Public (Stratford East) Dry Rot (Lyric Shaftesbury Avenue) Museum pieces Christopher Edwards Repression is a theme that recurs time and again in the work of the...

Television The Biondi effect Wendy Cope Akt the swimming-baths the women mostly do breaststroke and look where they are going. The men do crawl or butterfly and mow down...

Low life Alngry young man Jeffrey Bernard I had a very unpleasant experience in the pub last Sunday. I was sitting at the bar having a drink with Pickles when a lager yob,...

High life Anyone for tennis? Taki Salzburg IlHerr Grill is a very polite Austrian who is the fuhrer of the 35-and-over veterans tennis tournament in this most beautiful of...

SPECTATOR WINE CLUB --- -- - --- - I Black as sin and twice as tempting Auberon Waugh JT orrible things are happening to the price of good Rh6ne wines, especially Hermitage...