The whole of Europe is swinging right. Social Democracy IS crumbling in its established bastions. In West Germany the conservative party has had its second best general election...

The Tories' conference was a jollier affair than the previous week's events at Blackpool. Banquo's ghost appeared at the feast in the form of Mr Enoch Powell, and his scheme for...

The Tories and the TUC John Grigg The last Tory government was brought down by the trade unions and most people are now wondering if another Tory government would inevitably...

Fresh from her travels abroad, Mrs Thatcher joined her followers at the top of her form. She sees the Brighton conference as an election conference, believing that before there...

On Marina and misogyny Auberon Waugh One of the great issues of our time which is seldom, if ever, debated in public is the question of the ordination of women. While Tom...

Neal Ascherson Chancellor Helmut Schmidt is going to need all his officer-like qualities now. Sunday's election cut the coalition's majority to eight, made the opposition...

Patrick Cosgrave Metulla Near Metulla in Galilee the Lebanese and Israeli border fences are separated by a strip of road perhaps twelve feet across. Since the Lebanese civil...

Richard West Brussels The British need not feel homesick in Brussels, where they can dance at the British Rugby Club Disco, test their wits at the Anglo-Belgian Wargames Group...

Enoch Powell The publishers, with a candour exceptional in a blurb, describe Lord Home's auto biography* as 'utterly unpretentious'. Even SO, they have not hit upon quite the...

David Howell Property is a supreme value. It is, after all, only the idea of defendable private property, whether vested in a person's wage-earning capacity or his owned...

Andrew Alexander Wise men in politics and shrewd men in economics ask themselves a simple question from time to time. What are we doing or say ing at the moment which will, in...

Litter louts Elisabeth Dunn Deep down in the crevices of the limestone pavement above Malham Cove in Yorkshire, the fizzy drink cans wink and twinkle; away to the east, on the...

Grooms Jeffrey Bernard There was nothing remarkable about last week's Newmarket Sales. I only saw one record broken and that had nothing to do with horses. The record in...

Sir: The history of the Conservative Party is also the story of the rivalry between the interventionist and free market groups. On the outcome of that contest hinges the fate of...

Sir: Mrs Clissold either has not read our letters very carefully or is deliberately trying to create a false impression about what they contain. Neither of us has expressed any...

Sir: Rhodesians must be the only naive people left in the world. Who else would trust the nebulous word of the British and American governments to ensure a peaceful future in...

Sir: Amit Roy, despite the predigested 'sociology' of Peter Walker's diagnosis of bad housing and unemployment (incidentally given his record in government, why should anyone...

Sir: To quote R. Bainbridge (25 September): `I find myself in something of a quandarY, and should welcome the opportunity to air my problem in your columns.' What was Mr...

Sir: A telegram was sent to me while I was on holiday in Scotland. My neighbour supplied the messenger with my temporary address and the telegram was re-directed at a cost of £3...

On the margin Simon Raven Infants of the Spring: Vol. 1 of To Keep the Ball Rolling Anthony Powell (Heinemann £5.00) The Novels of Anthony Powell James Tucker (Macmillan...

Pat Rogers The Flesh is Frail: Byron's Letters and Journals, Volume 6: 1818-1819 edited by Leslie A. Marchand (John Murray £5.95) Byron Elizabeth Longford (Hutchinson/...

Donald MacRae Five Families: Mexican Case Studies in the Culture of Politics Oscar Lewis Introduction by Margaret Mead (Souvenir Press £4.00) This book has been praised as a...

Duncan Fallowell Chanel Edmonde Charles-Roux (Jonathan Cape £6.95) 'Hullo, Margot. Sorry I'm late.' 'Hullo, darling. What've you got there?' 'A new book on Chanel.' 'Oh yes,...

Nick Totton A Quiet Life Beryl Bainbridge (Duckworth £3.25) The Alteration Kingsley Amis (Jonathan Cape £3.50) A Quiet Lile might equally well have been named with another...

Benny Green Mostly Golf Bernard Darwin, Edited by Peter Ryde (A. and C. Black £4.25) There is nothing like inflated rhetoric on the flyleaf for putting the reader's back up....

Roy Fuller Matthew Arnold: Poet and Prophet A. L. Rowse (Thames and Hudson £6.50) This critical biography has one great virtue from which its other merits stem—Dr Rowse's power...

Anthony Lopez Raymond Radiguet Margaret Crosland (Peter Owen £4.95) Radiguet is the romantic biographer's dream, the precocious poet who dies young. He wrote a best-selling...

Blood clot Kenneth Hurren Tamburlaine the Great (Olivier, National Theatre) The Comedy of Errors (Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon) Carte Blanche (Phoenix) The...

Charles Champlin Los Angeles The untidy ranks of filmmakers include those who have been critics (Truffaut, Godard, Bogdanovich); editors ( Lean, Wise, Kramer, Ashby);...

Dutch art John McEwen Art historical exhibitions tend to be more critical, more analytical than of old in these days of Phd's, scepticism and broader education. The problem...

Nicholas Maw Rodney Milnes Although he is better known as a composer for the concert hall, mostly of vocal pieces, opera holds an irresistible fascination for Maw. 'I enjoy...

Deja vu Clancy Sigal I dislike introducing myself as the odd man out. But, contrary to what you may have heard from most other reviewers, Obsession (Plaza One, AA certificate)...

No access Richard lngrams Some years ago Mr Wolf Mankowitz retired to Ireland and joined that little band of émigré writers who as 'creative artists' enjoy the freedom from...