conference in Southport voted in favour of 16 year olds being allowed to appear in explicit pornography and of doctors being allowed to assist suicides. Mr Charles Kennedy broke...

0 ver the next few weeks, Britons all over the country will be filing into town halls for a series of public meetings over the future of the EU. Others will be participating...

stop sayin g 'surprisingly good for a cook'? A friend says tartly that it's a bit rich to complain — I could have been judged on my merits by writing under a pseudonym, only...

S pring has come late this year, punctuated by news of three horrible, doom-laden terrorist atrocities: the bombing of Shia worshippers in Iraq and Pakistan, the slaughter in...

them the sacked-but-not-even-ashade-bitter Lib Dem MP Jenny Tonge have been offering Charles Kennedy public advice on his health. By way of corrective, I telephoned the...

Boris Johnson says the challenge of immigration is causing Labour to change its mind on what it means to be British M y father's father's father was a romantic Turkish...

I was listening to Radio Four's serialisation of the Palliser novels while doing the washing-up after Sunday lunch, and I heard Mr Wharton saying that he preferred Arthur...

Five years after Nato went to war, Serbs are being ethnically cleansed in Kosovo, and the Albanians feel trapped. Andrew Gilligan tests the mood on the ground Pristina T he...

The American zone M Baghdad is all razor wire, chinos and Britney Spears; the Iraqi zone is traffic jams, garbage and roadside bombs. Richard Beeston reports Baghdad I am...

had it so good One year after the war began, Mark Steyn believes that anyone who looks honestly at liberated Iraq must see it as a success story New Hampshire 1 efore we get...

Rod Liddle has a radical explanation for Charles Kennedy's overheated performance at the Liberal party conference this week p o or Charles Kennedy. These days it is a punishable...

Jeremy Clarke talks to the BNP leader Nick Griffin, and is a bit shocked by his moderation L bouquet of red, white and blue flowers tied with a royal-blue ribbon has recently...

A weekly survey of world restrictions on freedom and free trade New citizens of the United Kingdom may soon have to undergo a citizenship test, pledging their allegiance to the...

T hose awful bombs in Madrid rather overshadowed a less sensational little story unfolding during the Spanish general election just passed. My brother-inlaw stood for the office...

I n July 1995 Tony Blair famously travelled to Australia to grovel at the court of Rupert Murdoch, whose newspapers in Britain subse quently offered him their support. Last...

M y tax accountant worked out that he was subsidising auditors and rubber plants. He was a partner in a firm whose offices were full of them, so he set up on his own without...

From Henry Hardy Sir: Congratulations on your linked group of articles on Faith and Reason (20 March). Though I agree with much of what your contributors say, I choked on one...

Sir: As a lapsed Catholic, I've always found it difficult to explain my wish for my children to be brought up as Catholics. Andrew Kenny's article succinctly outlined the...

Theodore Dalrymple ignores the fact that 'wicked' and 'evil' are theological terms and that it is the theology that gives the concept its meaning. Original Sin has not left a...

suggestion (Fear, loathing and respect', 20 March) that the Western Left sees Islam as the great new anti-capitalist hope. In the global competition of ideas and values,...

his attempt to demonstrate the existence of the soul is flawed (What it means to be human', 20 March). 'Bar at the Folies Bergere"is' a young woman only in the sense that the...

convince sceptics (Just think about it', Jonathan Barnes, 20 March): 'We lose nothing by choosing to believe in God, but we lose the possibility of eternal bliss if we choose...

From Fiona Pitt-Kethley Sir: I disagree with the central point of Dan Hannan's article 'Peace without honour' (20 March). I have lived in Spain for nearly two years. The Spanish...

From Daniel Stoffinan Sir: Mark Steyr' might want to check his facts a bit more carefully before offering a demographic analysis of the state of the world (One nation under...

From Sir Andrew Green Sir: In a radio discussion this week you expressed great surprise at the hostility of your readers to the account of an interview with me on immigration...

From Sheridan Morley , Sir: Could we turn our attention to the scandalous affair of your drama critic? The year or so since you fired me has been, I freely acknowledge, one of...

From Noble Frankland Sir: Hugh Lunghi hesitates to go on 'flogging the Dresden bombing issue' but does so for the sake of the 'record' (Letters, 20 March). The record, however,...

Nv hen I am asked, Who was the greatest artist of all?', I reply that I can never quite decide whether to pick Turner or Hokusai. These two men were near contemporaries: born in...

Beware the Docklands office complex, says Damien McCrystal f asked to name the visionary behind the development of Canary Wharf, most people who know anything about it would...

Ross Clark says that the middle classes should not begrudge the Chancellor a slice of their inheritance O f the many victims of Gordon Brown's great tax raids over the past...

A recent survey showed 1976 was the best year ever. Not if you were starting a City career, says Martin Vander Weyer I am looking at a group photograph of the Oxford University...

Robert Cottrell offers a rough guide to investing in the EU's new member states y . our smug neighbour with the new four-litre Volkswagen Touareg off-roader sitting in his...

Jeremy Chance says China's sheer size makes it unavoidable for investors, but far from safe 0 nce every few years the financial world gets China all out of proportion. Strangely...

Brett Mends reveals who the real winners were in last week's budget W hile half the City was at Cheltenham last week losing its shirt on Rooster Booster, colleagues left behind...

Jane Ridley A NEW ENGLAND? PEACE AND WAR 1886-1918 by G. E Searle OUP, £30, pp. 902, ISBN 019820714X T he old Oxford Histories of England were trusty bestsellers bound in pale...

David Hughes A PROFOUND SECRET by Josceline Dimbleby Doubleday, £20, pp. 336, ISBN 0385603231 A s with the opposite sex, there are few books you fall for and want for life,...

David Caute SOLDIERS OF LIGHT by Daniel Bergner Allen Lane, £16.99, pp. 202, ISBN 0713997478 OPERATION BARRAS: THE SAS RESCUE MISSION SIERRA LEONE 2000 by William Fowler...

Anne Chisholm WHERE I WAS FROM by Joan Didion Flamingo, £14.99, pp. 226, ISBN 0007178867 T hroughout her successful writing career, which began in New York in the early 1960s,...

Jonathan Mirsky MAKING THE FOREIGN SERVE CHINA: MANAGING FOREIGNERS IN THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC by Anne-Marie Brady Bowman & Littlefield, £18.95, pp. 286, ISBN 0742518620 1 n the...

Andrew Lambirth WILLIAM GEAR by John McEwen Lund Humphries, Gower House, Croft Road, Aldershot, Hampshire GUI] 3 HR, £30, pp. 128, ISBN 0853318670 T his is the first book about...

Patrick Skene Catling SURVIVAL FOR SERVICE: MY EXPERIENCES AS GOVERNOR-GENERAL OF GRENADA by Paul Scoon Macmillan Education, 175.95, pp. 357 ISBN 0333970640 A t the General...

Frederic Raphael STATUS ANXIETY by Main de Botton Hamish Hamilton, £16.99, pp. 314, ISBN 0241142385 I t's no surprise that one of Alain de Botton's favoured sources, in a text...

I see an old man walking down the street. He is my son and is remembering me. Now he is playing railways at my feet. . . . Spring comes. There's work to do: a bay tree To be...

Allan Massie THE BATTLE THAT STOPPED ROME by Peter S. Wells Norton, £19.95, pp. 256, ISBN (1393020282 I n AD 9 the Roman general Varus at the head of three legions was...

Kate Chisholm THE NEW HOUSE by Lettice Cooper Persephone Books, £10, pp. 319, ISBN 1903155371 T ‘ hank God that even in a family no one knows anyone else's nesses of her own...

Alexander Waugh SWIMMING WITH MY FATHER by Tim Jeal Faber, £12.99, pp. 198, ISBN 0571221009 I do not think it possible for anyone to write a memoir of his or her parents that...

Dean Godson HAMMER OF THE LEFT: DEFEATING TONY BENN, ERIC HEFFER AND THE MILITANT IN THE BATTLE FOR THE LABOUR PARTY by John Golding Politico's, £25, pp. 404, ISBN 1842750798...

Carole Angier ARTEMISIA by Anna Banti Serpent's Tail, £7.99, pp. 256, ISBN 1852427663 A rtemisia Gentileschi (b. 1593) is a feminist icon of such power that she has penetrated...

Jonathan Keates JABEZ : THE RISE AND FALL OF A VICTORIAN ROGUE by David McKie Atlantic Books, £12.99, pp. 284, ISBN 1843541300 F v ery one — well, almost everyone — knows that...

In primary colours like posies of spring flowers clumps of schoolchildren sit, cross-legged, listening to their teachers. Tezcatlipoca glowers on them, god of the Toltec...

The National Gallery's El Greco exhibition reveals to Martin Gayford the dangers of overcleaning T he great El Greco retrospective at the National Gallery is exceptional in many...

Peter Phillips I take my hat off to any performing ensemble in music that can survive for decades without having consistent public sponsorship, as a symphony orchestra has; and...

Andrew Lambirth Cecil Beaton: Portraits National Portrait Gallery, until 31 May We Are The People: Postcards from the Collection of Tom Phillips National Portrait Gallery,...

Lloyd Evans Mothers Against; Daughters of the Revolution Barbican When the Night Begins Hampstead TN avid Edgar is a great playwright who can't write a play. That didn't seem...

Patrick Carnegy Macbeth Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon, until 2 October Y ou are The Spectator's eyes and ears in Stratford, hoping your journey will be...

Mark Steyn The Passion of the Christ 18, selected cinemas r e headline on the Washington Post eview sums it up: — Passion" Is A Gory Take On A Gentle Teacher's Violent End'....

Giannandrea Poesio Mayerling Royal Ballet, Royal Opera House D espite a few dramaturgic weaknesses and some choreographic ideas that haven't stood the test of time, Kenneth...

Michael Tanner School for Fathers Royal Academy of Music Samson et Dallla Royal Opera House S chool for Fathers, E.J. Dent's loose rather than free translation of...

Michael Vestey R adio phone-ins are an acquired taste. Many dislike them and I'm not that keen on them myself, but sometimes they can give an idea of trends in thinking. It was...

Simon Hoggart orizon — the Truth of Troy (BBC2) was exemplary. It wasn't an expensive documentary; those are the ones where battles are represented by hundreds of extras in...

Robin Oakley C an there ever have been in the mere .....fortnight between Turf columns so much wailing and gnashing of teeth, so many tears and, in the end, thanks to those...

Taki I watched Harold Pinter on Paxman's programme and was shocked, shocked to discover how utterly useless the playwright was in defending his anti-war views. I never caught...

Jeremy Clarke I was there! At the rails, cheering Best Mate on to victory. At least I think it was Best Mate. Hard to tell when they gallop past in a bunch like that. I cheered...

Aidan Hartley Laikipia I don't usually observe Lent, but this year it crept up on me. The penances just happened. I'm not even a good Christian. But, let me tell you, this is...

Petronella Wyatt O na scale of one to ten, one being the least often, how frequently do you think about terrorism? Be honest, now. I don't mean the temporary shock and sympathy...

quantity. Merchants are clearing out their cellars to make room for the new stock, so they're selling off — not bin ends, exactly, which in some offlicences tend to be...

MICHAEL HENDERSON T he flowers that bloom in the spring, tra-la. And what a fine early spring to boot, The daffs are out in St James's Park, the cherry blossom is upon the...

for many years, I have not yet mastered the art of laughing at jokes that I do not find remotely funny. Can you think of any solutions? Name and address withheld A. It is well...

country cottage belonging to two married friends while they were away in Wales. Everything was perfect, including the extremely comfortable bed. The only thing that marred this...

about not remembering names after an introduction does not work for those of us who are over 50 and cannot punch a cellphone's tiny keyboard or read the LCD without a telescope....