Q. I had an NW to dinner last week, and
he was holding forth. I had just read your advice on how to deal with that (21 February) and intervened to say that the poor man needed a rest from Question Time interrogations. It now turns out that several people present had also read your column, Which suggests that at any rate in certain circles no one can possibly follow the advice you give: you often suggest a subterfuge, and if everyone recognises it then it is no longer concealed. Your advice is often designed to preserve or create a reputation for being an original and suave manipulator of awkward relations. That also is destroyed as soon as the subterfuge is discovered. Shouldn't your advice carry a warning: 'Never ever do what Mary says'?
Naive, Bletchley A. Thank you for your comments. My morale has been simultaneous& boosted and deflated. I see your point but take the view that, in the very small number of problems where the solution is rendered redundant by an incestuous readership, the publication of the problem itself still serves a useful social purpose. It acts as a caveat to those who might otherwise have unthinking& committed the very fawcpas described.
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