12 DECEMBER 1981

Page 3

Portrait of the week

The Spectator

M r Michael Foot unexpectedly repudiated the new Labour candidate for Bermondsey, 29-year-old Mr Peter Tatchell, an Australian and campaigner for homosexual causes, on the...

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What would Mr Jenkins do?

The Spectator

Ferdinand Mount A the back of a Commons cubby-hole, I chanced upon a pile of Bills. They had scarcely been touched. Dust was already gathering upon the eau-de-nil paper,...

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Notebook

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w hile The Times has long aspired to speak for the nation, it has this week scaled a new peak of respectability by becoming the mouthpiece of the sovereign herself. Its leading...

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Another voice

The Spectator

The Father Christmas Idea Auberon Waugh M r Tom Hunt, a scrap dealer in the east end of London, came briefly to pro minence last week when his 15-year-old son, Graham, was...

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A famous victory

The Spectator

Murray Sayle Tokyo B ack in Japan to find Fuji smothered in snow, the last of the autumn's persimmons plopping from bare trees and exports moving briskly, I see by the calendar...

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West Germany, two years on

The Spectator

Timothy Garton Ash Berlin, December 1983 T he first anti-nuclear demonstrator to be killed by American forces in Germany was buried here last Sunday. Hans-Dieter Narzisssohn,...

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Social Democrats falter

The Spectator

Andrew Brown Copenhagen T he only thing obvious about the results of Tuesday's Danish election is that there is a majority in the resulting parliament against any conceivable...

Page 12

Storm in a glass

The Spectator

Sam White Paris t is now evident that the French Socialist 'government is split on the issue that was always calculated to split it — economic policy. It would be tempting to...

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The Sungei Golok train

The Spectator

Richard West Kota Bahru, north-east Malaysia T he Malaysian communist Chin Peng, who started the insurrection that we came to know as the Emergency, is still alive, a...

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A minimum of enterprise

The Spectator

Allan Massie 'E nterprise: an undertaking; a bold or dangerous undertaking; an adventure; readiness, initiative and daring in undertaking.' (Chambers's Twentieth Century...

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Publishing

The Spectator

Good old Scrooge Paul Johnson W hen I last reported on the general state of the British publishing trade, in February, I described it as firmly in the grip of the slump. As...

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In the City

The Spectator

The Bank at bay Tony Rudd T he sequel to Noble House, that lengthy epic about the Hong Kong trading community which James Clavell has yet to write sets the Hong Kong financial...

Page 17

The meaning of faith

The Spectator

Sir: In case any of your non-Catholic (or possibly Catholic) readers may be wondering whether Auberon Waugh's judgment of Cardinal Hume in his review of Butler's Lives of the...

Sir: Neither Cardinal Hume, in his foreword, nor Mr Waugh,

The Spectator

in his review, distinguished between objective faith and subjective faith. Doubtless the Cardinal was writing about the latter. I regret that he did not say so. Objective faith,...

Fascists and the Right

The Spectator

Sir: It was disappointing to see your correspondent Stephen Aris's phrase 'blueshirted right wingers' (5 December). Although the blue shirt became the standard dress of Franco's...

Medal insult

The Spectator

Sir: May I correct an error in Mr Woodhouse's review of Auchinleck: The Lonely Soldier (28 November)? What was denied to those who served in the Eighth Army before Montgomery...

Subjective view

The Spectator

Sir: Might I phrase my disapproval of the use of the SODPAL abbreviation, inspired though it may be, in the 'Portrait of the Week' (5 December). This column has, after all,...

Page 18

Picking more Plums

The Spectator

Hugh Massingberd P. G. 'Wodehouse Benny Green (Pavilion pp. 256, £8.95) A Wodehouse Companion Richard Usborne (Elm Tree pp. 169, £12.50) Wodehouse at War lain Sproat (Milner...

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The other history man

The Spectator

Eric Christiansen History and Imagination ed. Hugh LloydJones, Valerie Pearl and Blair Worden (Duckworth pp. 385, £25) R ightly is they called Festschrifts. They were invented...

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Communards

The Spectator

Douglas Johnson The War Against Pads 1871 Robert Tombs (Cambridge University Press pp. 256, £22.50, £8.50) T he Paris Commune of 1871 lasted for 72 days. It began by accident,...

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Suburban Inferno

The Spectator

Francis King Bliss Peter Carey (Faber pp. 296, £6.50) m ephistophilis's stonily despairing 'Why this is hell, nor am I out of it', in Marlowe's Dr Faustus, might stand as a...

Salt on the tongue

The Spectator

P. J. Kavanagh The Black Soul Liam O'Flaherty (Wolfhound pp. 256, £6.90) A Minor Giant Peter de Polnay (Piatkus pp. 234, £6.50) T iam O'Flaherty was born in the Aran L./Islands...

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Morphic fields

The Spectator

Brian Inglis A New Science of Life Rupert Sheldrake (Blond and Briggs pp.229, £12.50). S ome 60 years ago William McDougall, Professor of Psychology at Harvard, instituted...

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Nevsky Prospekt

The Spectator

Ronald Hingley St Petersburg: A Travellers' Companion selected and introduced by Laurence Kelly (Constable pp. 303, £9.95, £5.95) This book is chiefly addressed to those 1...

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Heretics all

The Spectator

A. N. Wilson Priestland's Progress: One man's search for Christianity Now Gerald Priestland (BBC pp. 224, 0.50) N e lisez jamais les journaux religieux was the wise counsel of...

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Recent paperbacks

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James Hughes-Onslow Stephen Leacock selected and introduced by Robertson Davies (Penguin pp. 527, £2.95)Canada's answer to Mark Twain, or Thurber perhaps. 'You certainly seem...

Down from the attic

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Mark Amory The Oresteia (Olivier) T onger than Parsifal but not so funny', I said Noel Coward about something. Such unfair cracks were banished immediately The Oresteia began,...

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Human spirit

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John McEwen C raigie Aitchison's first retrospective exhibition (Serpentine Gallery till 24 January 1982) must surely convince anyone still in the need of it that he is one of...

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Reshuffle

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Bryan Robertson T o conspicuous advantage, the Ballet Rambert has reconstituted itself under the direction of Robert North, who has done so much in the past as dancer and...

Enduring

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Richard In grams T must say that every time I see John 1 Osborne on the telly I warm to him. One or two of his plays may be bloody awful but at least there is some life in the...

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Feminists

The Spectator

Taki New York O ne more week to go in the Big Apple and then, I hope, I shall be returning to a country where everyone isn't into Freudian insights. Just last week I managed to...

Looking back

The Spectator

Jeffrey Bernard ri" he week started off badly with the death of Michael Dempsey. When a really good bloke dies and at the early age of 37 it makes you wonder what on earth it's...

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Old Master

The Spectator

Raymond Keene I t is sad that just one week after Karpov had confirmed himself for the second time as the twelfth world champion, the fifth member of that illustrious group, Dr...