T he Government threatened one day to remove trade unions' immunity from civil actions. The Labour Party advised unions to seek ballots of their members to avoid unnecessary...

DEBORAH DEVONSHIRE T wo foods which are prime examples of the capricious ways of Mother Nature are wild mushrooms, which taste so different from the tame kind, and grouse, which...

Bishops have apostolic succession from St Peter, but Lord Runcie has chosen a different disciple BRUCE ANDERSON A chbishop Runcie is an impressive figure. At parties — which...

Would the West have been right morally to carry out its nuclear policy towards the Soviet Union? Peregrine Worsthorne, once the policy's supportet; now says no understatement...

It's that it's not based on anything scientific, says James Srodes. Even the pollsters admit it (privately) Washington, DC SEVEN weeks of hard campaigning are still left in the...

Michael Heath

Because a lot more readers have read A.A. Gill than have read his critics, says A.A. Gill I CAN see the funny side, the Schaden- freude side, the biter bit side, of a critic...

SOMETIMES my patients put me in mind of Shakespeare: there is poetry in their utterances, and it echoes that of the Bard. To give but one small example, last week a patient said...

A SNOB?' Profile: James Lees-Milne, who lives among hunting folk, but is the last of the aesthetes IT WAS appropriate that my first meeting with James Lees-Milne — elder...

I DROVE my husband into Winchester the other day and, while he was busy duti- fully replenishing the drink supplies of the cottage we had borrowed for a week from friends, I had...

Building a small cathedral to art in darkest Bayswater PAUL JOHNSON M y g reat-uncle James, an archetypal Forsyte, laid down the law on this point: 'No sensible man ever...

The nerd who bust the safe at Morgan Grenfell put not your trust in trustees CHRISTOPHER FILDES R anders too libellous to mention are rotating below ground or seething above...

Spengler was right Sir: I believe Christopher Coker misinter- prets the Spenglerian timetable ('What's left of the West', 7 September). Spengler equates the time, in various...

Sir: T.S. Eliot has had by far the greatest influence of any poet writing in English this century, and is easily the most memorable (Books, 7 September). Publication of juve-...

West marks an informed departure from the gen- eral ignorance of his work, except for an occasional ill-informed or trivial notice such as the falsehood in several current works...

Sir: In his review of Antonia Fraser's book on the Gunpowder Plot (Books, 31 August), Peter Vansittart refers to interpreters of the Jacobean era for whom Macbeth is more...

Bevis Hillier asks 'who reads The White Company today?' I do; and Sir Nigel and Rodney Stone, and the Brigadier Gerrard stories — though I find Uncle Berme unsatisfactory and I...

Sir: I am married to a career nanny. I was once a steady boyfriend but never a nanny- snatcher as mentioned by Leanda de Lisle (Country life, 31 August). Mrs de Lisle paints a...

Sir: Bruce Anderson is entitled to his opin- ions about the problems confronting the monarchy today (Politics, 24 August). But to blame these on Commander Richard Aylard is both...

Sir: Does Ronald Mutebi really think that the measures used to combat insurgency in Malaya . .. in the 1950s still rank among the worst human rights horrors in modern history'...

Sir: In defending herself against Stephen Glover's criticism of her report in the Observer on the recently reported relation- ship between the consumption of hamburg- ers and...

and other readers may be interest - ed to know that the copy of Cymbeline buried with Tennyson was not actually the one he was holding on his deathbed. That was volume 9 of the...

Sir: I fear that Mr Burt will obtain little comfort from writing to Mr Harold Brooks- Baker for answers to his questions (Letters, 31 August). I too, received an unsolicited...

Emma Nicholson and those feminists are wrong Mr Major was just being polite PETRONELLA WYATT M iss Emma Nicholson, MP, is like the common cold — you know you are going to be...

Have you heard the one about the biographer and the Archbishop? It's in the Times STEPHEN G LO V ER Most journalists would say the paper was right to publish this stuff. If the...

Ploys of the unemployed Philip Hensher REALITY AND DREAMS by Muriel Spark Constable, £14.95, pp. 160 R eality and Dreams is a curiously irrelevant title for this teasing, dry...

Jane Gardam EVERY MAN FOR HIMSELF by Beryl Bainbridge Duckworth, f14.99, pp. 224 B eryl Bainbridge's first novel in five years is a short, taut piece of historical fiction, an...

ALIAS GRACE by Margaret Atwood Bloomsbury, £14.99, pp. 480 T his brilliant fiction rests on ascertain- able fact. In 1843 Grace Marks, along with a fellow servant, James...

William Gaskill THE REAL LIFE OF LAURENCE OLIVIER by Roger Lewis Century, EZ99, pp. 272 T he author of this book apparently had some success with a similar work on Peter...

Nigel Spivey FORCE OF NATURE: THE LIFE OF LINUS PAULING by Tom Hager Simon & Schuster, £25, pp. 608 L inus Pauling won his first Nobel prize, for Chemistry, in 1954 — the...

ADMIRING SILENCE by Abdulrazak Gurnah Hamish Hamilton, £16, pp. 224 A the start of this novel, its unnamed narrator — like its author, a native of Zanzibar — displays all the...

Blair Worden THE STORY OF BRITAIN by Roy Strong Hutchinson, £30, pp. 700 N ever has our national history been harder to write. The specialisation of academic history by...

Bevis Hillier HORACE WALPOLE: THE GREAT OUTSIDER by Timothy Mowl John Murray, £19.99, pp. 274 Y ou don't have to believe that Judge Jeffreys was a lovable old buffer to...

John Cornwell THE SONG OF THE DODO by David Quammen Hutchinson, £20, pp. 702 O nce upon a time on the island of Mauritius there lived a bird known as Aepy- ornis Maximus, ten...

MAKING HISTORY by Stephen Fry Hutchinson, £15.99, pp. 390 T he truism has it that comedians make us laugh to prevent themselves from weeping. And so when they fail, the...

Patrick Skene Catling PERFECT HAPPINESS: THE SEQUEL TO JANE AUSTEN'S EMMA by Rachel Billington Sceptre, £14.99, pp. 378 R achel Billington, handsome, clever and resourceful, has...

Fi( non: Morality Play by Barry Unsworth, Penguin, £5.99 Fullalove by Gordon Burn, Minerva, £6.99 The Contract by William Palmer, Vintage, £5.99 Four Last Things. by William...

Straight to the point What kinds of drawings do sculptors make? Richard Shone on their work in the 20th century A passionate argument about the respective merits of painting...

Culture's new champion John Parry W e all know that there are no votes in the arts, don't we. Well, don't we? No actor or singer, let alone a bus driver, is going into the...

The Magic Flute (Queen Elizabeth Hall) Circus tricks Michael Tanner O pera Factory's The Magic Flute is a somewhat incoherent production of a work which already has quite...

Emma (U, selected cinemas) The great neck show Mark Steyn M issed the last Jane Austen country wedding? Don't worry; there'll be another along in a minute. After Pride and...

The Tailor-Made Man (Cockpit) The Heidi Chronicles (Greenwich) Blinded by the Sun (National Theatre) Design for living Sheridan Morley O ne of the most intriguing tales from...

There are still no firm plans for the completion of the Cathedral in Bury, writes Alan Powers . T ime has a curious relationship to architecture. Buildings last a long time....

Frauenkirche within 10 years, says Simon Courtauld W herever you look in Dresden these days, you are likely to see the Frauenkirche. Not the real thing, of course — that was...

Season of discontent Ursula Buchan there is a better instance of the malev- olence of inanimate objects than that exhibited by plastic garden netting, I should like to meet...

There is more to Indian art than temple art, says Vaishali Honawar F or the West, Indian art is synonymous with temple art. A year ago, on a visit to England, I was struck by...

Off their trolley Simon Hoggart S upermarket Sweep (ITV, weekdays) is described as cult daytime viewing, which usually means that, students watch it if they're up in time. It...

Mutual therapy Michael Vestey T here's been a listlessness about the dying days of summer on Radio Four. George Formby, I was at first pleased to hear, was presenting Today,...

Serious stuff Robin Oakley I t is the kind of morning that makes you wonder how any of us can ever bear to work in an office. The surrounding fields are stuffed with pheasants...

Health warning Taki Gstaad Glorious weather has finally hit the Alps, and I'm out bright and early each morning getting healthier by the minute. After a lightning trip to...

The cutting edge Jeffrey Bernard Anyway, I was there preparing to go into the Merchant Navy and it was only episodes like that which made me change 'But, before I begin, be it...

Careless talk Leanda de Lisle M y husband is busy sending out shooting invitations, so I must start think- ing about dinner parties again. These tend to be a more complicated...

BRIDGE A bold bluff Andrew Robson THE COLUMN (August 17) in which East held all 13 spades (on a goulash deal) gen- erated considerable interest. After East had chosen to open...

THE STAR at Harome (pronounced 'Harum') used to be one of Yorkshire's legendary drinking parlours, celebrated for being, at the same time, both an unspoilt village pub and a...

IN•THE-STRAND SIMPSON'S IN.THE-STRAND CHESS Latrunculi Raymond Keene A POSSIBLE ancestor to chess hit the headlines during the past week when a 2,000-year-old board game...

4111) FYnl1 1.01101 1510 COMPETITION Fair is foul Jaspistos IN COMPETITION NO. 1949 you were asked for a Wordsworthian sonnet, begin- ning with the first line of his one...

1278: Professor Stephen by Doc A first prize of £25 and a bottle of Graham's Late Bottled Vintage 1990 Port for the first correct solution opened on 30 September, with two...

The balance of bat and ball Simon Barnes A CRICKET match is invariably won by the side with the best fast bowlers. There may occasionally be exceptions to this rule, as in the...

Dear Mary.. . Q. As private secretary to the ambassador of a foreign country, it is necessary to spend a lot of time in His Excellency's company. Indeed, we often breakfast...