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PORTRAIT OF THE WEEK
The SpectatorAct of God A rush-hour rail crash near Clapham Junction, south London, left 33 people dead and 113 injured. It was attributed to a faulty signal circuit. Common Market ministers...
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The Spectator, 56 Doughty Street, London WC1N 2LL Telephone 01-405
The Spectator1706; Telex 27124; Fax 242 0603 TIME FOR ICONOCLASM AINT RAISA' gasped the banner headline on the front page of Monday's Today. Underneath was a huge photo- graph of Mrs...
THE SPECNOR
The SpectatorSUBSCRIBE TODAY — Save 15% on the Cover Price! RATES 12 Months 6 Months UK 0 £49.50 El £26.00 Europe (airmail) 0 £60.50 0 £31.00 USA Airspeed 0 US 199 0 US$50 Rest of Airmail...
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POLITICS
The SpectatorMr Gorbachev announces a birth: will Pinochet be the godfather? NOEL MALCOLM E ND (the journal of the European Nuclear Disarmament movement) had a cover picture earlier this...
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DIARY G. M. TAMAS
The SpectatorT he most interesting news to come out of England this year — apart from the two dons who actually came to blows over the merits of Moll Flanders, splendid fellows — was the...
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ANOTHER VOICE
The Spectator'It appears to have been a mugging which went tragically wrong' AUBERON WAUGH I have been haunted by a sentence which I read in the Sun on Saturday. My country edition led...
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THE CRACKS IN THE ICON OF GORBACHEV
The SpectatorMr Gorbachev has appointed himself the evangelist ' earthquake has shown up his weakness and intolerance Moscow THE passage of a new, ostensibly more democratic, constitution...
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One hundred years ago
The SpectatorWE have received three or four letters complaining that we have not noticed Lord Salisbury's blunder at Edinburgh in calling Mr Dadabhai Nourojee a 'black' man. It is not our...
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A GANGPLANK FOR THE BOAT PEOPLE
The SpectatorPeter Gill reports on the British repatriation policy for those who escape Vietnam EVER since North Vietnamese tanks rol- led into Saigon and the last anti-communist president...
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WITCH-HUNTERS SABOTAGED
The SpectatorMark Almond recounts an attempt to stop academics discussing Hitler and Stalin `APPARENTLY this man compares Hitler with Stalin.' That was not Erich Honeck- er's outraged...
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A STRIKING MUDDLE
The SpectatorDiana Geddes on the current confusion and disorder in France Paris 'WHO would have thought that we would see a Socialist government bringing in the police and the army to help...
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THE DISSENT OF MOUNT CARMEL
The SpectatorChristopher Howse examines the case of the nuns who are holding out for a harder life THE black and white of a nun's habit behind a heavy-barred grille made a good photograph...
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WHY BRITAIN IS NO DEMOCRACY
The SpectatorAnthony Barnett explains why Charter 88 should be a rallying point BRITAIN is a gloriously democratic coun- try was the reply from Downing Street to an American reporter who...
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WITHIN A CITY WALL
The SpectatorWallace Clark looks at the 300th anniversary of the siege of Londonderry There is a green hill far away. Without a city wall, Where the dear Lord was crucified, Who died to...
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BANGING THE BINS OF HISTORY
The Spectatorthe United States giving Gorby more than his due THE events taking place in the world today are sufficiently striking in them- selves, I should have thought, to make hyperbole...
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Wilcox's winner INMOS is the most successful privatisation there has
The Spectatorever been — successful for us as the sellers, that is. This magical electronic chip-shop, set up in the days when govern- ments thought they could spot industries on which the...
Goodwill written off
The SpectatorNO wonder the City has been plunged into seasonal gloom and is purging goodwill from its balance-sheets. Goodwill (this is my contribution to accountancy) is the difference...
Seasonal fluctuations
The SpectatorNEW from City and Suburban this year is a selection of useful and acceptable gifts. (I prefer this 'genteel phrase to the Financial Times's nouveau-riche heading, 'How to spend...
CITY AND SUBURBAN
The SpectatorThe Government kicks the dog to teach its inflated cat a lesson CHRISTOPHER FILDES h is week brings the figures the Chan- cellor tells us to watch. The Retail Prices Index...
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THE ECONOMY
The SpectatorThe sting what does the good JOCK BRUCE-GA RDYNE Mr Lawson's sentiments precisely, I imagine. Sales advertisements appearing in Oxford Street even before the Christmas...
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LETTERS
The SpectatorHospital malaise Sir: In Jock Bruce-Gardyne's article `Mr Lawson buys off the dentists and opticians' (5 November), he expects but derides the probability that all the £2...
Sir: Nikolai Tolstoy is right to dwell in detail on
The Spectatorthe fate of Cossacks and others repatriated to certain death in the USS1k. at the end of the war; however, this should be less to ascribe blame than to learn the lessons of...
Chinese history
The SpectatorSir: It's good to see Auberon Waugh (Another voice, 19 November) taking an interest in Chinese affairs, but I'm sorry that he has swallowed the guff about '5,000 years of...
Party and religion
The SpectatorSir: Your correspondence about bringing British national parties into the Northern Ireland arena raises the question, 'Who and how many are the Catholic unionists in the...
War crimes
The SpectatorSir: Alistair Home excoriates Nikolai Tol- stoy for 'all the trouble he had caused' (Letters, 19 November) but he has no harsh words for successive British governments which...
World Service
The SpectatorSir: When I read John Tusa's letter to you (3 December) about the World Service I thought at first that I had strayed to the pages of the New Statesman. Obviously Tusa will...
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Practice
The SpectatorSir: In your leading article 'To be precise' (19 November) I was pleased to read once again in your pages a plea for the English language. The sentence which struck me most...
Dothekids
The SpectatorSir: The article by Alexandra Artley (`Kids' Stuffing', 12 November), in which she praises the idea of teaching the mean- ing of words alongside their practical application,...
Scripture knowledge
The SpectatorSir: Kingsley Amis suggests that his 'Pro- ject Outlawing Tintinnabulation In Pubs, Hotels And Restaurants' would be im- possible because nobody has heard of Potiphar (`Sod the...
Staggering
The SpectatorSir: As an ordinand in training for the priesthood at one of the 'frightful' theolo- gical colleges collectively condemned by Ferdinand Mount in his review of Dr Gareth...
Six-footer
The SpectatorSir: Some of the hexameters in your competition (5 November) were ingenious. Nash was right, though: The Hexamiter verse I graunt to be a Gentleman of an auncient house (so is...
Bodily functions
The SpectatorSir: My 13-year-old daughter would like to point out to Auberon Waugh (Another voice, 26 November) that it is a nonsense to refer to a 'two-parent-but-no-children household'. Is...
Wee Frees
The SpectatorSir: It is right to point out (Diary, 12 November) that the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland, to which the Lord Chancellor belongs, is not the 'Wee Frees'. But the church...
`...and statistics'
The SpectatorSPEAKING of sheets, did you know that Andrex sell enough toilet paper each year to build Mount Everest? (Epson photocopier advertisement, the Guardian, 28 September). Have...
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BOOKS
The SpectatorAn agonist who ran to suffering David Gilmour F ew people have been subjected to such extremes of judgment as T. E. Lawrence. Churchill regarded him as 'one of the greatest...
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Ivory tower goes into orbit
The SpectatorJohn Biffen THATCHERISM S hortly we reach the tenth anniversary of Margaret Thatcher's Conservative gov- ernment. There is a veritable growth indus- try in publications...
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Lying under the greenwood tree
The SpectatorFrances Spalding A RING OF CONSPIRATORS: HENRY JAMES AND HIS LITERARY CIRCLE, 1895-1915 by Miranda Seymour Hodder & Stoughton, £17.95 pp.327 H enry James's asssociation with...
Explaining the undead
The SpectatorAnthony Daniels VAMPIRES, BURIAL AND DEATH by Paul Barber Yale, £14.95, pp.224 T here is a je ne sais quoi about death. Young doctors soon come to recognise it, even without...
AMONG NEXT WEEK'S CONTRIBUTORS John Bayley on naval warfare Raynaond
The SpectatorCarr on sporting art Max Egremont on English country houses
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Billiards and curling win
The SpectatorJohn McEwen SPORT AND THE ARTIST, VOLUME I: BALL GAMES by Mary Ann Wingfield The Antique Collectors Club, £29.95, pp. 359 B all games, on the evidence of this book, have not...
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More than a Green Mouth
The SpectatorDavid Profumo FORGOTTEN LIFE by Brian Aldiss Gollancz,111.95, pp.284 T hey hate me!', cries Sheila, the phenomenally successful author of science fantasy, as she reads her...
Prying is a pleasure
The SpectatorFrancis King A MIND AT EASE: BARBARA PYM AND HER NOVELS by Robert Liddell Peter Owen, .£13.95, pp.143 R obert Liddell, now in his 81st year, was a close friend of four of the...
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Humorous Books
The SpectatorFailures more attractive than success Richard Ingrams W hat an opportunity has been missed with The Essential Osbert Lancaster (Bar- rie & Jenkins, £15.95, pp.192)! Someone...
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Art Books
The SpectatorVolumes at an exhibition David Ekserdjian h e most obvious way to organise the shopping list for the annual Christmas round-up of art books is chronologically, but all that...
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Born to be King, he almost was
The SpectatorKevin Sharpe CHARLES EDWARD STUART: A TRAGEDY IN MANY ACTS by Frank McLynn Routledge, £24.95, pp. 640 I t is the legendary figures, larger than history, who are only with the...
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ARTS
The SpectatorExhibitions 1 The rush on Russian Giles Auty Russian Paintings (Roy Miles Fine Paintings, till 22 December) Russian Paintings (Century Gallery, till 20 February) A s the...
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Theatre
The SpectatorSmelling a Rat (Hampstead) Cupboard lovers Christopher Edwards h is is the latest in a line of plays devised by Mike Leigh in collaboration with a cast. The actors are given...
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Exhibitions 2
The SpectatorViews of war Gavin Stamp W ar can inspire, or generate, great art. The Imperial War Museum surely houses one of the finest and most repre- sentative collections of...
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New York theatre
The SpectatorRumors (Broadhurst Theatre) Farce master Douglas Colby T he initial half-hour of Rumors, Neil Simon's 23rd comedy but his first venture into farce, is moderately amusing in...
Photography Towards a Bigger Picture, Part II (V & A,
The Spectatortill 15 January) Eye- Francis Hodgson B eing a museum curator is one of those difficult professions in which the skilful marshalling of other people's talents pro- duces a...
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Pop music
The SpectatorChristmas crackers Marcus Berkmann W ith Christmas looming in its usual dispiriting way, it's time to start thinking of those records you're going to buy for yourself rather...
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Television
The SpectatorSummoned by birds Wendy Cope I . n a week of disasters I have spent several hours looking at scenes of horror and tragedy with a growing sense of inadequacy. Something in me...
High life
The SpectatorMay the best queen win Taki G New York ood old Prince Philip. By pronounc- ing that wives and hookers are one and the same he said what I've been trying to tell the world...
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Low life
The SpectatorEastern Promise Jeffrey Bernard S peaking as a man with little faith I find this whole business of Christmas one hell of an inconvenience. It must be even worse for a turkey....
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Home life
The SpectatorNappy Christmas Alice Thomas Ellis I remember Caroline remarking once with quiet sincerity that she hadn't got a grain of cuddly granny in her. We were discussing the prospect...
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Single quinta ports
The SpectatorPORT is odd in so many ways. In Bor- deaux or Burgundy, the idea that a single vineyard wine is inferior to a blend of several vineyards runs counter to the most sacred spirit...
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Imperative Cooking:
The SpectatorHOW BIGBIG is your repertoire? My mater- nal g reat- g randmother's was 14. She oper- ated a menu which was the same every week but chan g ed from summer to winter. Festivities...
How to save yourself 51 trips to the library ..
The Spectator. or almost £30 on The Spectator If you're forced to share The Spectator with fellow students, then you'll know how difficult it can be to track a copy down. Now you can save...
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COMPETITION
The SpectatorTata Ltd Jaspistos I n Competition No. 1553 you were asked to write a report, after a particularly difficult assignment, by an employee of an agency which provides...
CHESS
The SpectatorHenceforward Raymond Keene I n Alan Ayckbourn's futuristic new play, whose title I have borrowed to head this week's article, at one point a character asks why humans are...
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Solution to 886: Vice squad
The Spectatororia E ' S , T 1 . 1 ' E s S Ilia Bala nail• AE E T H nrIEICEI _fl n w A i A T 0 R E 117131 FIE 01313113121 ij al 8 E T ACMIglii!!!I ann El 0 12 I E N L D i E rt - ii c Ind A...
No. 1556: Domestic bliss
The SpectatorSickeningly sentimental and unreal scenes of family life are associated with Victorian fiction. An extract, please (maximum 150 words), from a contemporary novel with the same...
CROSSWORD
The SpectatorA first prize of £20 and two further prizes of £10 for the first three correct solutions opened on 9 January. Entries to: Crossword 889, The Spectator, 56 Doughty Street, London...
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BOOK HERE FOR A WORLD OF TRAVEL
The SpectatorFrom Graham Greene at Dien Bien Phu to Peter Acicroyd in Greenland, or from John Betjeman on never having been to Venice to Jeffrey Bernard cruising in Norway, here is a...
BOOK OF CROSSWORDS
The SpectatorThe 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...