7 JULY 1973, Page 16

Suppression

Sir: I have been called many things in my time (there was a Maoist pamphlet only the other day, for instance, which accused me of being not only the dregs of humanity, but even an associate of Norman St John-Stevas), and usually find myself unmoved by abuse, for sufferance is the badge of all my tribe, or words to that effect. Still. I really didn't imagine that you, in The Spectator, would be the one who compared me to, among others, Streicher, even though it is true that you were — with that characteristic graciousness of yours, so much remarked upon wherever two or three are gathered to-' gether in the four-ale bar — good enough to say that I was only like Streicher on my off days. You did not, to do you justice (actually. I would rather like 'to do yob, justice; oh my word I would like to 'do you justice), imply that the similarity between Streicher and myself was based on my Spectator July 7,1973 9 well-known habit of putting Jews in wish to prevent the expression of views gas-chambers; only, it seems, my with whichl disagree Now when a man is accused of advocating something that he has spent almost exactly twenty years, practically full-time, denouncing and opposing, he is, I think, entitled to a certain latitude of expression in commenting on the accusation. So I would be obliged if you would permit me to say that your suggestion that 1 have ever advocated, or ever do or would advocate, the suppressio Bernard Leviof any

body's views, is a f e I body's views, is a f e I London WI Solecistic obscenity demeans you. Bernie. — Editor, The Spectator,