Precious persona
Sir: My modest persona being naturally More precious to me than my little book, I could hardly help noticing that of the two facts cited as a basis for observations about me, Michael Bentley's review (Books, 14 April) got two of them wrong. Since my resignation as Higher Education Minister I have not written `some journalism in the Times' — indeed not a word for it, which suggests that there may be a subjective colouring to his reflections of these phan- tom articles. I am not blaming Mr Bentley for not reading my regular column in the Daily Telegraph; academics are busy folk, Preconceptions about the press are not unknown amongst them, and as a Minister, I may have inadvertently cut his newspaper budget. As for my diplomatic career which Mr Bentley inverted to illustrate a relentless descent into obscurity — it was in fact Russia, Peking, Paris, and Principal Private Secretary to two Foreign Secretar- ies: an inglorious progression, maybe, but like my book, the best I could manage in the time.
George Walden
House of Commons, London SW1
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