Emergency' to all 25 million households in Britain; it recommends keeping indoors with bottled water, tinned food, a battery radio, spare batteries and a first-aid kit in case...

B ut why is Diana's fountain being closed? Some people are decently embarrassed at the failure of this £3.6 million waterwork. Some people may be secretly amused. They look at...

original George MacDonald Fraser novel about the caddish officer, set at the time of the first Afghan war. You can now stay at Gandamack Lodge, a handsome if dilapidated villa...

I , is hardly unprecedented for rising Tories to fall out with their seniors, and vice versa. Before the war, Anthony Eden's friends used to com plain about the 'Old Gang'...

Ross Clark says that if the government were to mount a real fight, we could defeat the animal rights terrorists — and prevent unnecessary suffering in the laboratories B esides...

Does the US still have the will to win? Mark Steyn on the stark choices facing Americans in November New Hampshire E veryone wants to know what the key demographic will be in...

Rod Liddle says the idea that war would bring democracy to the Middle East is as absurd as all the other reasons given for invading Iraq T , here's one question which the...

There was nothing gallant about little Belgium in the first world war, says Paul Belien 0 n the morning of 4 August 1914 — 90 years ago next Wednesday — the British Cabinet,...

We continue to receive entries of great brilliance for the Spectator Classics Cup, but in order to generate the greatest possible competition we remind readers of the rules. I....

Young men are being bullied into examining themselves for testicular cancer. It's not very dignified, says Brendan O'Neill, and may do more harm than good Nv hy is New Britain...

M. Jacques Myard, the bouncy French deputy, was talking on the wireless the other day about 'unsecurity . . I am not mocking his English; there was a word unsecure in the 17th...

F or English vintners, 2003 was the annus mirabilis. English wine has been steadily improving for decades now — long since a vigneron in Cognac could tell me, 'Yurr English...

Given what we now know about Iraq, says Malcolm Rifkind, it is intolerable that the PM remains in office while journalists have been forced to resign T ony Blair has done more...

L ast week the government made one of the most momentous announcements of this Parliament. Geoff Hoon, the Secretary of State for Defence, unveiled unprecedentedly swingeing...

I hastened last Friday to the Grays Inn studios of five news on Channel 5 to be interviewed for their 7 p.m. bulletin alongside Nick Watt of the Guardian, on the sensation of...

From Randhir Singh Bains Sir: Anthony Browne is quite right to claim (The triumph of the East', 24 July) that Muslims have an open agenda of taking over Europe through...

From The Lord Hanson Sir: I take particular issue with one shabby part of the recent Parliamentary committee recommendation to cancel all honours for all civil servants. To deny...

From Philip Pullman Sir: In an article about the dark state of current children's literature (`Read me a dirty story, Mummy', 24 July), Rachel Johnson says, it's well known that...

From Sally Mustoe Sir: Ross Clark echoed the disappointment Lady Bennett and I felt 35 years ago when we organised our first England Ball ('Why the British are so mean', 24...

From Stephen Bates Sir: Much as I hate to spoil a good Paul Johnson story (And another thing, 24 July), I can't help thinking it's unlikely that Herbert Sutcliffe told the young...

From Eileen Barker Sir: Tom Sackville's letter of 29 May contains manifestly false allegations about Inform and myself. Inform has demonstrably not 'supported cult leaders for...

From Julian Le Grand Sir: I'm sorry to disappoint Frank Johnson (Shared opinion, 10 July) and your correspondent (Letters, 24 July), but I am not entirely fictional, nor did I...

I have often complained about the shortage of fountains in London. How many can you think of? Well, there are the jets in Hyde Park's Italian garden, not far from where I live;...

Philip Hensher HATCHET JOB: WRITINGS ON CONTEMPORARY FICTION by Dale Peck The New Press, $23.95, pp. 228, ISBN 1565848748 A curious volume, this, and you would be right in...

Christopher Bland CHARLEMAGNE'S TABLECLOTH: A PIQUANT HISTORY OF FEASTING by Nichola Fletcher Weidenfeld, £20, pp. 256, ISBN 0297843435 T he most enjoyable feast described by...

Rupert Christiansen JANE CARLYLE: NEWLY SELECTED LETTERS edited by Kenneth J. Fielding and David R. Sorensen Ashgate, £50, pp. 372, ISBN 0754601374 J ust how unhappy was Jane...

James P. Carley THE LIFE AND DEATH OF ANNE BOLEYN by Eric Ives Blackwell, £25, pp. 434, ISBN 0631234799 T he meteoric rise and swift fall of Anne Boleyn, she of the thousand...

Robert Barnard THE SHOOTING PARTY by Anton Chekhov translated by Ronald Wilks Penguin, £7.99, pp. 240, ISBN 0140448985 A crime novel by Chekhov? Professor John Sutherland...

Owen Paterson THE END OF THE LINE: How OVER-FISHING IS CHANGING THE WORLD by Charles Clover Ebury Press, £14.99, pp. 320, ISBN 0091897807 T here is much to commend this book....

Digby Durrant POSH: PORT OUT, STARBOARD HOME AND OTHER LANGUAGE MYTHS by Michael Quinlan Penguin, £12.99, pp. 278, ISBN 0140515348 T here never was a ticket with the word...

John Michell DREAMING TO SOME PURPOSE: AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY by Colin Wilson Century, .C20, pp. 402, ISBN 1844131882 C olin Wilson is a very great man, 'the only important writer in...

Andrew Lambirth encounters Nesperennub in rather more detail than he wishes M ummies have exerted a strange fascination over Westerners ever since the first tomb was rifled and...

Laura Gascoigne Boudin, Monet and the Sea Painters of Normandy Bowes Museum, until 30 August c A very impressive pile of stones,' is how the driver of my taxi from Darlington...

Michael Tanner Carmen Glynclebourne C annen ranks very high on the fairly short list of operas that I can't imagine myself ever getting tired of listening to or seeing. That's...

Alastair Macaulay Don Quixote, Swan Lake, Romeo and Juliet Royal Opera House W hen ballet is great, its dancers — and we with them — seem to exist in more dimensions than in...

Stuart Nicholson r y all the BBC television programmes l..../shown on Norwegian TV, I wouldn't mind betting that Ground Force goes down like a lead balloon. I mean, take all...

Lloyd Evans Mercy Soho Snoopy! The Musical New Players L ights out at the Soho Theatre. Mercy, Lin Coghlan's new play, opens in obscurity, gropes towards darkness, stumbles...

Patrick Camegy Hamlet Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon I t would be hard to imagine a greater contrast than that between the Ben WhishawrTrevor Nunn Hamlet which...

Mark Steyn King Arthur 12A, selected cinemas Ving Arthur is not your father's Round ./X.Table. There's no castles, no sword in the lake, no Mordred, no Holy Grail, no Camelot,...

Alan Powers ( - 1 ountry-house fires are not unknown in our time — remember Uppark. In England, they tend to be genuine accidents, as was the fire at Wotton House,...

Michael Vestey "Vro sooner had I written last week about how fortunate Radio Four was to have Helen Boaden as its controller than the BBC announced that she was moving on to...

Robin Oakley Eloreplay can be even more fun than the real thing. For contests like the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Diamond Stakes, where older horses take on the current...

Taki On board SIY Bushido I know, I know, it's a bit much, filing from one's yacht — but, what the hell, it's not every day that hacks own boats. One thousand, one hundred...

Jeremy Clarke very Friday for the past three months ' I've been doing my boy's mother's shopping. She's unable to get out to the shops because she's agoraphobic, and her...

Petronella Wyatt T he other day I was asked by a friend to a lunch party. I told her that, unfortunately, I would have to leave early as I had a very important appointment at...

make a fool of yourself — which is the latest global offshoot of the legendary Harry's Bar in Venice and is, by all accounts, the hottest ticket in town. Luckily my NBF, Nicky...

FRANK KEATING B ritannia rules the waves, and aptly for the island race by far the best bets for gilded triumphs at the upcoming Olympic Games are on the water. While the more...

tip to your readers. We have recently had new neighbours move in who keep a terrier, which is locked in the house all day while the owners are out at work. The constant whining...

party given by a host with a famously large fortune. I was invited as a friend of a friend. Thirty or more tables were set up throughout the downstairs of the house and we all...