Aznar, the Prime Minister of Spain, in Downing Street, as negotiations by Mr Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, to hand over Gibraltar to Spain foundered over the use of the...

The Spectator, 56 Doughty Street, London WC1N 2LL Telephone: 020-7405 1706; Fax 020-7242 0603 DON'T BLAME BUSH I t is fortunate for the reputation of Horatio Nelson that...

I t has been mentioned in print already, so I am not breaking confidences to confess that, yes, the first hint of Tony Blair's wish to change the Lobby system, which Trevor...

ANDREW GIMSON T he Labour party has started a campaign to 'reconnect', as Philip Gould puts it, with the working-class voters who have deserted it since 1997. Mr Gould, whose...

MATTHEW PARRIS T his year, to celebrate the Queen's Golden Jubilee, city status is being conferred on the many applicants for that supposed honour. Derby has never recovered...

Aidan Rankin says that most homosexuals are moderates, but militants make the running, and gay politicians and entertainers now enjoy the protection of 'victim' status IT IS a...

Diana Mosley applauds the new tolerance and lays a myth to rest DR JOHNSON defines the word 'bugger' in his dictionary as 'a term of endearment' among sailors. Nevertheless,...

Boris Johnson finds that Lord Bingham disagrees with the government on drugs, among other things LORD BINGHAM is a wiry, athletic-looking fellow. In his youth he was famous...

She also wore Nikes and her maid of honour weighed in at 3501b: Roger McFallon attends a cowboy wedding on the Canadian prairie Southern Alberta IN the small prairie church,...

THERE is no stopping folk-etymology, as the recent fiddle-faddle over fitly-gritty demonstrated. Policemen said that they had been forbidden to use it because it was deemed...

THE government spin doctor, Alastair Campbell, confessing that his past efforts had destroyed the credibility of New Labour, began his soul-searching analysis with the words,...

Luke Slattery on why left-wing politicians Down Under like to keep their eyes and ears on the higher things of life Sydney TONY BLAIR might be reluctant to express publicly...

Douglas Davis, of the Jerusalem Post, says that the Corporation is reinfecting Britain with the virus of anti-Semitism WOULD I. asked the BBC researcher who called from Radio...

Some people dream of owning a Lear jet but for me it would be a huge blossom-pink diamond. These beautiful accidents of nature can be found in shades from raspberry to delicate...

A lot of cranks swear by organic food, says Martin Gayford, but that is no reason for not buying it ALMOST every Sunday. if I can, I walk into the centre of the town where we...

tendency of worthy organisations to be hijacked by fundamentalists. One might have imagined that there was more than enough neglect, child-beating and paedophilia to occupy...

Martin Walton says that the Irish still don't like the English . . . because they feel inferior Dublin OUTSIDE Galway, at Moran's Oyster House, I approached an evidently...

SOME people have been so good as to suggest in the public prints that I lack compassion; and one person even went so far as to assert, in a celebrated journal, that I merely...

Hugh Russell on the story of a Zambian farmer who killed three gangsters with three bullets. . . to the delight of the local police Lusaka THEY came for Robert at midnight....

From Mr Martin Huggins Sir: One of the unspoken advantages of the old House of Lords was that it provided a cheap and harmless grazing ground for politicians rejected by the...

criticise a fellow Spectator reader. I do feel that Chris Patten entirely misses the point in his recipe for bringing democracy into the workings of the EU. Why should English...

From Mr Chris Bertram Sir: While sympathising with much of Simon Heffer's fulmination about the erosion of Britain's democratic institutions (`The case for anarchy', 18 May),...

From Mr Guy Stair Saintv Sir: While there is much truth in Mark Steyn's passionate endorsement of American democracy ('Sweet land of liberty', 18 May), its extent may be limited...

From Sir Stephen Hastings Sir: We should be grateful to Philip Gould (Power to the people', 18 May). Never has the confusion and inanity of New Labour thinking been so...

From Mr Mark Damazer Sir: Stephen Glover's relentless campaign against the BBC led him to say (Media studies, 18 May) that BBC television news had 'almost entirely ignored' news...

From Mr P.M. Roebuck Sir: Michael Henderson (Sport. 18 May) says that I missed the imbroglio after Michael Atherton had been filmed putting soil on a cricket ball because I had...

From Mr Peter Tatchell Sir: I am, for once, in wholehearted agreement with Peter Hitchens (`Keep quiet or face arrest', 11 May). The conviction of Harry Hammond for displaying a...

From Mr Trevor Lyttleton Sir: My favourite Spectator columnist, Petronella Wyatt (Singular life, 18 May), attributes the 'declining standards of behaviour' of our pensioners to...

From Mr Kelvin MacKenzie Sir: I am outraged at Bruce Anderson's (`Knickers to Kelvin MacKenzie', 18 May) description of me as having the attentionspan of a mayf If you would...

STEPHEN OLON, ER E 'er since Robert Thomson became editor of the Times two and a half months ago, I have picked up the paper with something more than my usual enthusiasm. How...

PAUL JOHNSON L ate this year, or early in the next, we are going to witness a battle of wills, as well as armies, in the Middle East, on a scale that will go down in history as...

Philip Hensher M ichael Frayn has been awarded this year's Heywood Hill Prize, and nobody is going to argue with that. The prize is not for an individual work, but in...

Jeremy Swift RACUNDRA'S THIRD CRUISE by Arthur Ransome, edited by Brian Hammett Femhurst Books, £14.95, pp. 128, ISBN 1808660891 A rthur Ransome remains an enigma. The facts of...

Running up to the Day-Mark Through the spring heather And high on the evening sea air, I flushed the distant bird — It launched on barred wings, Sank fast within half a furlong...

Raymond Carr EMPIRE, WAR AND FAITH IN EARLY MODERN EUROPE by Geoffrey Parker Allen Lane, £25, pp. 411, ISBN 0713995157 P rofessor Parker is one of the three most distinguished...

Sara Paton THE MAN WHO DECIPHERED LINEAR B: THE STORY OF MICHAEL VENTRIS by Andrew Robinson Thames & Hudson, £12.95, pp. 168, ISBN 0500510776 CHe died, like all geniuses, at...

John Laughland FROM KOSOVO TO KABUL: HUMAN RIGHTS AND INTERNATIONAL INTERVENTION by David Chandler Pluto, .f15.99, pp. 268, ISBN 0745318835 D avid Chandler has emerged in...

Hugh Massingberd THE STUARTS' LAST SECRET: THE MISSING HEIRS OF BONNIE PRINCE CHARLIE by Peter Pininski Tucicwell, £16.99, pp. 317, ISBN 186232199X T hirty-odd years ago....

Gabriele Annan HEAVEN ' S EDGE by Romesh Gunesekera Bloomsbury, £16.99, pp. 234, ISBN 0747558132 T he blurb says that Heaven's Edge is 'a love story set in a spoilt paradise...

I n 1226, Kubla Khan ordered the slaughter of all the inhabitants of a central Asian city he was besieging because his father, Genghis, had been killed during the course of the...

Byron Rogers AUTO DA FAY by Fay Weldon A utobiography turns on trust: it is a long tale told in a darkened room, on which you cannot question, let alone crossexamine, the...

David Ekserdjian G uide books may be a law unto themselves, but even within their weird and wonderful ranks this one is not like any other I have ever come across. Hitherto,...

Martin Gayford believes we have no reason to be worried by art: just look, relax and enjoy it D oes art make you anxious? If so, you are probably far from alone. In a recent...

Andrew Lambirth explores the little-known delights in the capital of the Levante V alencia is Spain's third city (after Madrid and Barcelona), but has as yet been mercifully...

Mark Glazebrook on why portrait painting has such appeal I quickly forgave Roy Strong, shortly after he had succeeded David Piper as Director of the National Portrait Gallery,...

Andrew Wordsworth on Lucian Freud, who celebrates his 80th birthday this year I t's a curious paradox that some of the finest studies of the English character have been painted...

Susan Moore on how collectors of Irish art have become more discriminating W ill it last? It is the question asked every year as the annual Irish auctions loom large in the...

Giannandrea Poesio B lessed be the Seventies for having been so kitsch, so colourfully naive and outrageously silly. Created in 1975 by the great master of ephemeral ....

Toby Young A nyone who's seen an RSC production in the last 25 years will know that it's almost unheard of for a director to stage a classic play in anything other than modern...

Robin Holloway A coincidence of interesting anniversaries means that I'll have to stagger writing about them if justice is to be done. The conjunction of William Lawes's birth...

Michael Tanner A mong the seemingly endless sprawl of Richard Strauss's later operas, Daphne is distinguished by a combination of comparative compression, vitality and surging...

Mark Steyn I caught the new Star Wars at a matinee which started late, which meant I and the ten other fellows who wanted to see it were kicking around outside the theatre for...

Simon Hoggart B ig Brother is upon us again, and Channel 4 kicked off the festivities with a fascinating programme called How Not To Get On Big Brother. Television really has...

Michael Vestey W hatever's going on in the garden, however much leaf might be uncurling on the branches or flowers coming into bloom, it's the arrival of Test Match Special on...

Robin Oakley I f the suspension total mounts much further this season and Godolphin, Stoute and Dunlop have further trouble finding jockeys, I would like to let them know that...

Taki INew York I was that rarest of occasions, an oldfashioned dinner-dance for 476 people given by a couple celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary, without a corporate...

Jeremy Clarke L ast week I borrowed a fiver from the Big Issue seller. I only asked for two quid, but he lent me a fiver on condition he had it back by Saturday. He's always...

OK, I'm in the mood for getting right down to it this week. Yes, you heard right. I'm going to get right down to it without any rambling, shilly-shallying, time-wasting tours of...

Catherine Coley EVERY so often, an estate agent comes out with an alarmist prediction of how high house prices are going to rise. Earlier this year, Knight Frank calculated...

Sebastian Deckker PEOPLE say, 'Length is important.' This was especially true when purchasing leasehold residential property in London. However, with a succession of...

YOU can always tell a buffoon, but you can't tell him much. After beating a willing if hapless Spaniard, one Manuel CaIvo, in the London Arena last Saturday, Naseem Hamed turned...

my teenage children will soon be exposed to a craze for something known as freakdancing. I am told that the activity is undesirable. Can you enlighten me as to what exactly is...

whom I would like to get to know better. He is a quite well-known poet and, following our first meeting, he sent me a couple of slim volumes through the post. I have studied...

someone who, as well as being something of a control freak, is very possessive over her friends. I met a woman there whom I would like to see again, but I know that, had I asked...