The marriage of the heir to the British throne inevitably leads one to reflect on the monarchy and its function today. There are two broad categories of government in western...

'Even with much of our export trade in the JL. doldrums, it is with subdued jubilation that I report news of one overseas triumph. A British firm of architects has just won a...

The Prince of Wales and Lady Diana Spencer were married after a week in which the bride brought joy to 3,000 disabled people at a Garden Party. And it was learnt that two...

Winds of social change Ferdinand Mount Is Warrington merely a Torrington or Orpington, a high tide of discontent with the two big parties which will recede as the General...

Arts Council's proudest hour Auberon Waugh One never thought one would applaud any decision of the Arts Council on its policy towards literature, and closer investigation...

Nicholas von Hoffman Washington An eye for an eye is acceptable, but a hundred eyes for an eye is causing grumbles. For a few, at any rate. The Israeli bombing of Beirut had...

Richard West New York The nearest bar that was open late at night had an Irish name, and whimsical prints of an Irishman letting a small boy search his pocket for sweets, and...

Michael Humfrey About a year ago, while I was in London on a brief visit, an intense young social porker in Notting Hill told me: 'The West Indian teenagers in London are...

Ronald Mutebi In early December last year I gave an outline in the Spectator of the contesting parties, the principal participants and the likely outcome of the first elections...

Roy Kerridge A monarchist in theory, in practice I seldom go where monarchs are. They lead their lives and I lead mine. This mutual arrangement came to an end on Wednesday when...

The Queen's marriage with Prince Albert was made an occasion of general festivity in the Metropolis and in the Provinces. The weather, on which much depended, though...

The populist at County Hall Wilfred De'Ath 'I've lost him temporarily — he went off to get a drink and he hasn't come back,' says one of the two secretaries sitting outside...

C. H. Sisson The Thirty-Nine Articles are rather unfashionable reading, but they are very good reading none the less. They are, of course, much spat upon by Anglicans these...

Collective wisdom Paul Johnson It is the great weakness of minor celebrities, as well as the ambition of those who aspire to such precarious status, to figure in lists of...

Industry at risk Tony Rudd The way that British industry is financed is one of the more crazy aspects of our already fairly unsatisfactory economy. Ideally, industry is meant...

Sir: Describing the last hours that preceded the death of his master, the great and good constitutional monarch Edward VII, that equally great and good courtier, Fritz Ponsonby,...

Sir: To Tony Samstag's question CA pathetic fallacy', 4 July): 'Would you believe that the American government recently wound up a three-million-dollar scheme to buy thousands...

Sir: Members of our Association were discussing the article in the Notebook of 20 June which dealt with the quantity of tea consumed by Mr Wedgwood Benn. Is it possible for you...

Sir: In your issue of 11 July you printed a letter from Mr House of Collins Publishers, stating that tapes of Alistair MacLean's books are available through the Royal National...

The elegant miniaturist Geoffrey Wheatcroft Words and Music Philip Hope-Wallace (Collins pp. 280, £9.95) tew workaday journalists are well advised to collect their occasional...

Anthony Storr The Life and Letters of John Kent; Joanna Richardson (The Folio Society pp. 176, £7.85) John Keats was born on 6 October 1795, and died of tuberculosis on 23...

Douglas Johnson The Origins of History Herbert Butterfield (Eyre Methuen pp. 252, £12.50) Historians are a fidgetty lot. In their smart but sullen craft they are for ever...

Peter Paterson The Vestey Affair Phillip Knightley (Macdonald pp. 159, £7.95) There used to be a crude working-class joke about — presumably — the Prince Consort being the...

A.N. Wilson Last Quadrant Meira Chand (John Murray pp. 194, £6.95) The English, like the damp and the Jews, will get in anywhere; their expatriate survival in all parts of the...

Richard Shone The Mad Bad Line: The Family of Lord Alfred Douglas Brian Roberts (Hamish Hamilton pp. 319, £15) This astonishing book has the makings of a truly outrageous...

Colour slides Peter Ackroyd The Oberwald Mystery ('A', Camden Plaza) A silver horse casts blue shadows over an orange field: the colours resemble some mismatch between...

Reversals Mark Amory Can't Pay? Won't Pay! (Criterion) Restoration (Royal Court) Dario Fo's One Woman Plays seemed to me so bad that I did not bother to argue or explain. I...

Life lines John Mc Ewen It is symptomatic of the comparative neglect the English artists Gilbert and George (Gilbert holds an Italian passport but as a team they undoubtedly...

Over-exposed Richard Ingrams One consequence of the Royal Wedding this week will, with any luck, be a slight let-up in the amount of television publicity given to the happy...

Two kings Taki Although this is hardly the tinie to reminisce about such matters, the last European king to lose his throne was King Constantine II of Greece. Constantine was...

Test match Jeffrey Bernard As I write these lines the sun is smiling down on St Paul's Cathedral. It will all be over in three hours' time. The Kentish Town polo team will...

Preview Raymond Keene On Monday 3 August the 1981 British Championship starts up at Morecambe, sponsored once again by the stockbroking firm of Grieveson Grant, who must, by...