`Comrades.' I n a serious embarrassment to the Gov- ernment's programme, Mr John Wake- ham, the energy secretary, said that the privatisation of nuclear power would be...

TIC OR The Spectator, 56 Doughty Street, London WC1N 2LL Telephone 01-405 1706; Telex 27124; Fax 242 0603 A ONE-SIDED CURTAIN he Iron Curtain torn open', said the front page...

The staggering progress of privatisation NOEL MALCOLM In any normal week this melt-down of the Government's plans would have dominated the headlines for days on end. Last...

QUENTIN CREWE T he pleasures of homecoming, so often marred by burst pipes, burglaries, pet deaths, melted deep-freezes, sickly plants, fallen ceilings and other unlooked-for...

Why she must go, Part II: her treatment of Mr Worsthorne and other inhuman crimes AUBERON WAUG H In a pub near Taunton I heard rumour of a family living in Kent who had...

The geography of Berlin has changed overnight. of Europe may be redrawn soon Berlin ONCE upon a time, and a very bad time it was, there was a famous platform in West Berlin...

Diane Geddes reports on French attitudes to the prospect of German reunification Paris 1 LOVE Germany so much that I'm glad there are two of them,' Francois Mauriac, the...

American's understand the East Germans: shoppers of the world, unite. Washington WHAT to the British is Remembrance Sunday is to the Americans 'the Veterans' Day holiday'. You...

The British Government is in danger of letting Pol Pot take back control Site 2, on the Thai-Cambodian border EVERYONE knows that the Khmer Rouge are despicable. It is less...

K. L. Billingsley uncovers memories of a man who knew too much ON 24 November, 1959, a Thanksgiving Day, the body of a man was discovered in a New York City park. There was a...

Michael Trend talks to Sir Anthony Meyer, today's chief stalking-horse THE disturbance in the Conservative Party at Westminster has evoked comparisons with that which...

The press: Paul Johnson thinks that quality newspapers should avoid vulgar abuse THE power of a newspaper to bash politi- cians is considerable. But it should be used...

SUBSCRIBE TODAY — Save 10% on the . Cover Price! RATES 12 Months 6 Months UK 0 £66.00 0 £33.00 Europe (airmail) 0 £77.00 0 £38.50 USA Airspeed 0 US 599 0 $49.50 Rest of...

Shiva Naipaul was one of the most gifted and accomplished writers of our time. After his death in August 1985 at the age of 40, The Spectator set up a fund to establish an...

DO IT again and get it right. Nuclear fission has now blown such a hole in the plans for privatising electricity that there is no sensible choice but to tear them up and make...

THE spirit of Mr Justice Cocklecarrot now hangs over justice in the City. All we lack is Honeyweather Gooseboot QC cross- examining 12 red-bearded dwarves. Failing that, I...

MY machine prints decimal points like this 000 to distinguish them from full stops . . . and of course from noughts 000 or capital 000s or small 000s. So I tried to say last...

The paymasters of Europe stand back and send the bills to Germany CHRISTOPHER FILDES I t is a pleasure in these astounding times to watch the markets trying, like the rest of...

Sir: We are writing in connection with an article 'The Caucasian National Front' (28 October). While the article gives some examples of the hardships suffered by Azeries in...

Sir: It saddened me to read (`Sins of commission', 21 October) that Quentin Crewe finds British ambassadorial staff an embarrassment, even though he signed the book. When I was...

BR care Sir: I am pleased that Wendy Cope (Tele- vision, 28 October) should go outside her brief and comment on British Rail and their present advertising. The divergence...

Sir: Oh dear; the unthinking Establishm ent (science establishment) line (Scenes from science, 20 October). The most interesting thing about the tri al surveys on sexual...

Sir: 'How surprised he would be to know he had given birth to a slasher movie,' writes Hilary Mantel, invoking the shade of Charles Williams, friend of C. S. Lewis and writer of...

BhS has never had a strong freehold property portfolio and it is simply untrue to say that Sir Terence sold freeholds and saddled BhS with expensive leaseholds. Nor have we...

Sir: I cannot allow C. A. Basset's cruel and provocative comment (Letters, 4 Novem- ber) on your distinguished humourist Wal- lace Arnold to pass unchallenged. Most of us...

Sir: I'd like to make a few points that arise from Richard Abram's letter about mod- ern Bach-performance (21 October). First it is hardly 'anachronistic' for Vaughan Williams...

Sir: Alexandra Artley's excellent article on the Thomas Coram Foundation for Chil- d ren, 'A foundling father to our children' (21 October), has generated considerable interest...

Sir: Problems with junk mail? Over here We have sometimes found it helpful to (a) detach the guaranteed prepaid return post- age from the offending correspondence and (b) use it...

Sir: Mr Edward Whitley's article (`Design and fall', 11 November) about retailing and my Part in it was wildly inaccurate and con- tinued to perpetrate misinformation inven- ted...

OVER - ZEALOUS. A classical euphem- ism for the actions of policemen, social workers, and anyone with statutory authority to wreck lives, whenever they exhibit a devotion to...

Nirad C. Chaudhuri focuses on the unexplained contradictions of the man behind the political figure. Hard by yon wood, now smiling as in scorn, Mutt'ring his wayward fancies he...

Alternative agriculture IT'S a pity that the word 'alternative' should come to us now overshadowed by the hangover from its hippy usage 20 years ago, in appellations such as...

Truth is ugliness Colin Welch WILLIAM HOLMAN HUNT: THE TRUE PRE-RAPHAELITE by Anne Clark Amor Constable, f16.95, pp.301 H ow did Ruskin manage equally to admire both Turner,...

Andrei Navrozov BORIS PASTERNAK: A LITERARY BIOGRAPHY, VOLUME ONE by Christopher Barnes CUP, £35, pp. 528 P amela by Samuel Richardson, whose tercentenary is passing unnoticed...

Patrick Skene Catling ENCOUNTERS edited by Kai Erikson Yale University Press, £14.95, pp.163 A fter all the superfluous details of so many unduly protracted biographies, it...

David Willetts LOSING OUT by Frank Field Basil Blackwell, £22.50, pp. 196 T here are two main genres of socialist criticism of the Government's social poli- cies. Some...

Harriet Waugh D ick Francis' annual treat for his admirers is out, and it is a good one. The story races along without any phoney plotting to slow it down. The hero of Straight...

The ceremony at the Cenotaph Gets days like this. It's very still and dank. My father, grave and pinched, wears a thick scarf But stands dead rigid like the sombre rank Of...

Alan Watkins DICK CROSSMAN: A PORTRAIT by Tam Dalyell Weidenfeld & Nicolson, .C14.95, pp. 253 T here is a case for saying that biog- raphers are usually more interesting than...

No name you know reminds you now Of who you are or why you go Alone about your trouble in the snow. Forgetting whom you would forget You have forgotten more than that And lost...

Museums Climb-down at the V & Nicky Bird T he V & A has capitulated. Last week it conceded what the rest of the museum world has always known, that the 'restruc- turing'...

Ashkenazy's return Mark Archer I Moscow t was unfortunate that Vladimir Ashke- nazy's historic return to Moscow after 26 years was dogged by more than its fair share of...

The Master Builder (Bristol Old Vic) The trouble with Ibsen Christopher Edwards I t is one of the received ideas of modern criticism that public taste lags behind great art....

Medee (Covent Garden) Heavenly lengths Rodney MiInes T he nasty scrunching sound you heard last week was the musical press putting its collective bovver-boot into the Royal...

Michael Craig-Martin: a Retrospective 1968-1989 (Whitechapel, till 7 January) Not so funny Giles Auty W alking round the retrospective of Michael Craig-Martin's work at the...

Dancers on a Plane (Anthony d'Offay, till 2 December) The grand old avant-garde Andrew Solomon J ohn Cage is almost 80; Merce Cunning- ham is past 70; and Jasper Johns is on...

A Short Film About Killing (`18', Cannon Premiere) The sin of Cain Hilary Mantel A n empty cigarette packet, the stiff corpse of a rat, a cat hanged by children in front of a...

Unmissable pictures Wendy Cope I n the old days, when I wanted to hear the news, I would switch on the radio and get on with other things at the same time. Obliged to pay...

Licensed to settle down Zenga Longmore T hat's it. I've made up my mind, and there's no use trying to persuade me out of it. Never again am I going out without Omalara. Since...

Booked solid Taki f any of you think the quality of life in London ain't what it used to be, try visiting it for a couple of days after living in the Big Olive for a while. I...

Speeding Raymond Keene 0 ne of the most popular ways of bringing top chess before the public has been the innovation of Speed Chess, in which games are completed in either 50...

Railway romance Jaspistos I n Competition No. 1600 you were in- vited to provide a publisher's blurb for one of two titles from a new British Rail romance library: First-Class...

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`Small Earthquake in Chile' is a famous boring headline. One occurred the other day, and my paper bravely added, 'There were no reports of any damage or injuries. A report,...

A first prize of £20 and two further prizes of £10 (or, for UK solvers, a copy of Chambers English Dictionary — ring the word `Dictionary') for the first three correct solutions...

%JP/L. nPIL..md tit "L-fi r k-"ft."..-ALS A L--A IF MUSIC be the food of love we can celebrate its patron on 22 November, Saint Cecilia's day, though how she came to be chosen...