'I'm not sayin' you didn't buy it here, I'm sayin' just show me the guarantee.' A Greek cruise liner carrying 400 British school children sank off Piraeus in Greece following a...

1706; Telex 27124; Fax 242 0603 WHAT SEPARATES US I n our cover article on page nine, Timothy Garton Ash sets out the reality of Britain's isolation in the EEC. Since mak- ing...

Notes from underground during the Thatcherite terror NOEL MALCOLM T his House believes that the suppres- sion of human rights in the Soviet Union is a fallacy propounded by...

JENNIFER PATERSON I cannot for the life of me understand all this fuss and criticism of the Duchess of York leaving her very small baby the Princess Beatrice at home while she...

BRITAIN'S teenagers are a real boring bunch.' [Over] . . . 13,000 [youngsters participated] • • . in [a] . . . Barclays Bank survey last Easter . . . Boys scored . . most for...

Poles apart from the Ascherson theory of freedom AUBERON WAUGH very new weekend deluge of news- papers and magazines through the letter- box is bound to give anyone who spends...

France and Germany have good historical reasons for pressing ahead with European integration. We ignore this at our peril, argues Timothy Garton Ash The point of this story is...

Defence is the only issue that really matters for the West in this US election, says Ambrose Evans-Pritchard Washington FLICK through the 1988 editions of Fore- ign Policy,...

Richard West weathered the storm amid political blasts and counter-blasts Managua HURRICANE Joan battered the Nicara- guan government almost as much as the town of Bluefields,...

Diana Geddes finds the French government unbending towards the strikers Paris FOR the past month, France has been subjected to a series of strikes and demon- strations: first...

Gerda Cohen finds out how Palestinian violence affects Israeli voters Western Galilee A RAVISHING sea is flicked by small waves, ultramarine on the horizon, azure inshore. The...

who exculpate British authorities for handing over the Cossacks THE release of the Cowgill Report de- scribed by Christopher Booker in his arti- cle 'The conspiracy that never...

Oxford wants £200 million. Michael Trend reports on the only university insititution which inspires loyalty WHAT IS an Oxonian? The question is not as straightforward as some...

Dominic Lawson meets the first female chess genius in history GO TO Ladbrokes. Go to William Hill. Go somewhere, and place a bet that by the end of the century a woman will...

Judy Lomax defends the skill and courage of the aviatrix who died last week IN SPITE of the convention that one should not unnecessarily speak ill of the recently dead, when...

The press: Paul Johnson surveys the latest national circulation figures WHEN I was an undergraduate, a cynical don, discoursing on ambition, said to me: `The great thing in...

STANDS Scotland where it did? Here is its biggest brewery, the biggest employer among its manufacturing companies, and just about the oldest chestnut among shares rumoured for...

Lifeboat Week must steer clear of the wreck of Barlow Clowes CHRISTOPHER FILDES I t seems to be National Lifeboat Week without the collecting boxes. Forced dona- tions are...

THE right time to send out a lifeboat is before the ship has gone down, and when the wreck may bring others down — when it is a risk to the whole system of naviga- tion. Barlow...

IRREGULAR actions breed irregular verbs, and the City needs a new one, 'to insider-trade'. This would conjugate as follows: I am close to the share Thou art just popping out to...

Sir: Following the article on 1 October by Alexandra Artley who argues for universal nursery education from the age of three, we have received many requests for our schools'...

some fundamental issues. She sug- gests that early' childhood educators in Great Britain need to be highly educated and trained graduates, capable of inter- preting sound...

Sir: As one who has researched for 14 years on Anglo-Yugoslav wartime rela- tions, particularly on the 'Klagenfurt Affair' of May and June 1945, I found interesting three...

SUBSCRIBE TODAY - Save 15% on the Cover Price! RATES 12 Months 6 Months UK El £49.50 D £26.00 Europe (airmail) El £60.50 El £31.00 USA Airspeed 0 US $99 El US$50 Rest of...

Sir: I have been reading your 17 September issue containing Doina Cornea's letter to Ceausescu whilst driving myself about the Caucasus, and, having noted the high-rise blocks...

Sir: Kingsley Amis (according to Auberon Waugh, 8 October) believes the modernist movement (which Amis says did not aim to please, but to shock, baffle, impress) would never...

Sir: In your otherwise excellent editorial of 24 September you write that the contribu- tors to Index on Censorship arc 'particular- ly justified in complaining that the...

Sir: I am amazed at Charles Moore's dogmatic assertion (Diary, 8 October) that `you cannot take your pets to heaven'. Cynthia Lady Sandys, who has been in communication for...

Sir: Auberon Waugh (Another voice, 22 October) accuses me by name of practising Soviet-style disinformation on my readers on behalf of Harold Wilson, in the extracts from The...

Sir: Alice Thomas Ellis (Home life, October) may not meet undertakers at the parties she attends; but I can tell her that I go to plenty of parties. I reckon I am considered the...

THE idea is that readers should take out half-price Spectator subscriptions for peo- ple in Poland. Potential recipients in Po- land will be identified with the help of the...

NICHOLAS GARLAND IN the fourth episode of his existence as a comic strip character, Barry McKenzie, fresh off the boat from Australia, writes a letter introducing himself to an...

The Spectator is looking for someone to help with typing and administration for both the advertising and editorial departments of the magazine. Short- hand would be a distinct...

Brink of a strange world Ferdinand Mount THE COLLECTED ARTHUR MACHEN edited by Christopher Palmer Duckworth, £19.95, pp.376 M odern eyes do not care to peer too closely into...

Patrick Trevor-Roper EDDY: THE LIFE OF EDWARD SACKVILLE-WEST by Michael De-la-Noy Bodley Head, f16, pp.341 E ddy was a great individualist, with considerable gifts which were...

Peter Levi JOURNEYS TO THE UNDERWORLD by Fiona Pitt-Kethley Chaim, f10, pp.226 I thought it was an advanced revelation 30 years ago that there are not real poets and...

Autumn, yellow as jaundice, clothes the road and reaches to the gate. Thought is no more than a shift of gears at the drive: a rush of gravel and a sudden silence. Inside, the...

Miranda Seymour THE LETTERS OF EDITH WHARTON edited by R. W. B. Lewis and Nancy Lewis Simon & Schuster, £16.95, pp.654 E dith Wharton achieved her long- standing ambition to...

Gilbert Adair PEGGY ASHCROFT by Michael Billington John Murray, .£15.95, pp.312 P eggy Ashcroft's poise was her fortune: it could have been insured at Lloyds for some fabulous...

Michael De-la-Noy THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS I imagine the only experience of happi- ness that commands universal recognition is that of falling in love. A Bach cantata is hardly...

Francis King THE FOUNTAIN by Charles Morgan Robson, £12.95, f7.50; pp.431 THE RIVER LINE by Charles Morgan Robson, £10.95, £5.95; pp.227 L ike Galsworthy's and Hugh Wal-...

Dance Prometheus unsound Deirdre McMahon The Royal Ballet (Covent Garden) W ith the advent of the new regime at the Royal Opera House, there has been a lot of soul-searching...

The Dawning (`PG', Odeon Haymarket) Innocents abroad Hilary Mantel I reland, 1921: Nancy Gulliver is 18 and s just left school. Her father disappeared years ago and her...

Cream cornettists Martin Gayford he cornet has been out of fashion for 60 years. Early New Orleans music was dominated by cornettists such as King Oliver and Buddy Bolden,...

Bartholomew Fair (Olivier) Mountain Language (Lyttelton) An Enemy of the People (Young Vic) All the fun of the fair Christopher Edwards E xuberance and a raw, teeming vital-...

John Wonnacott (Marlborough Fine Art, till 18 November) Paula Rego (Serpentine Gallery, till 20 November) Muddy waters Giles Auty W hile John Wonnacott continues to find...

Summer's over Wendy Cope T hings went a bit wrong on Sunday. The day began well, with me at my desk bright and early, too intent on work to glance at the Sunday papers. At...

regular critics MUSIC Schoenberg: The Reluctant Revolutionary continues at the South Bank Centre. Highlights will be Maurizio Pollini playing Brahms, Schoenberg, Stockhausen...

In praise of Petronella Taki L ast Sunday evening in the Big Olive I went out looking for poets and sonneteers to sing the praises of a 20-year-old girl, Petronella Wyatt....

Silver spoon wanted Jeffrey Bernard telephoned Newmarket last night and I all is well for the time being. The Inland Revenue, though, are lurking in the wings and for that...

Hawkers welcome Alice Thomas Ellis T wo little girls knocked at the door the other day and asked if there were any odd jobs they could do to make money for some charity or...

A first prize of £20 and two further prizes of £10 (or, for UK solvers, a copy of Chambers Dictionary, value £13.95 — ring the words 'Chambers Dictionary' above) for the first...

Glacier-hanger Raymond Keene The Reykjavik le g of the Grandmaster Association World Cup finished on Mon- day ni g ht, with yet another Kasparov victory, The world champion...

The unrecorded Jaspistos I n Competition No. 1546 you were asked for an ima g inary extract from the diary of the wife of a famous or infamous man. There were more Patient...

have had it for a long duration. Those terrible early evenings fill me with gloom. It is dark in the morning whatever they do, so why ruin the afternoon as well? There is talk...

You are invited to write" a plausible piece of prose (maximum 150 words) containing the following words in any order: top- quality, dabchick, hymnology, defiant, erst- while,...

Leaves from the commonplace book of Wallace Arnold `LOVED your piece in the Spec the week before last, Kingsley.' I had managed to corner the King at a literary gathering of the...

The Spectator enjoys a high reputation for its crosswords, which attract a large weekly postbag. This collection of 100 puzzles fea- tures the work of their three resident...

SPEOTOR SPECTATOR DIARIES FOR 1989 are now available price £7.50. Embossed initials 50p per diary. Postage and packaging: UK no charge, overseas £1.50. To place your order by...