TE SPEGTIOR The Spectator, 56 Doughty Street, London WC1N 2LL Telephone: 071-405 1706; Telex 27124; Fax 071-242 0603 DON'T STOP NOW If ever there were an occasion for fiscal...

Not charming people Sir: Charles Moore, in Another voice (27 November), asks, 'Why does everybody hate the Unionists so much?' and partly answers his own question by adding, 'I...

Appealing to the masses Sir: As one of the 'men in suits reduced to a state of gaga idiocy', may I say that Sophie Constanti (Arts, 20 November) is taking an 6litist and...

The F T's Falstaff Sir: I am sorry if Martyn Harris was put oUt by my 'grovelling profile' of Prince Charles (Arts, November 27th). I thought I had managed to stay on my feet...

LE TTERS No regrets Sir: In the wake of my latest remarks in the debate about news values, Mr Rusbridger (Diary, 27 November) chose to revive the argument over my...

Easily Confused Sir: I apologise for carelessly misattributinlg a quotation about heterogenous images Yoked by violence together' to T. S. Eliot (Another voice, 27 November)....

Tut, tut Sir: Your leader of 20 November wais offbeam in several respects. It is quite wrong to say that the B3ritish Government has done nothing at all on the Spread of...

Duty called Sir: Whatever else about the Prince and Princess of Wales's marriage ('Time to restore private lives', 21 November), it passes belief that the Princess did not...

Flawed paradise Sir: The article which you published by the Kabaka of Buganda, Ronald Mutebi ('My struggle for a throne', 16 October), was well crafted by the King and made...

Daughter of Eve and more Nicholas Fleming AMARYLLIS FLEMING by Fergus Fleming Sinclair-Stevenson, £20, pp. 256 First a word about the profusion of people here called...

Listen With Mother Only this: an old armchair, a sideboard, sun on carpet; time, and the child uncurls, strokes the warm dog sleeping, dances to find her mother. She can hear...

Was love then a bag of sweets? John Whitworth THE SHIPPING NEWS by E. Annie Proulx Fourth Estate, £14.99, pp. 337 M uch American scorn has been poured on the European Art...

Dipping a TOE into the cosmic ooze John Cornwell THE QUANTUM SOCIETY by Danah Zohar and Ian Marshall Bloomsbury, £14.99, pp. 306 Hardly a week passes nowadays without the...

The Measure There's hardly a better way of doing nothing than sitting on a Lough Eske wall speckled with green and orange lichens and overshadowed by foxgloves four feet tall....

A spectacle of pairs Nigel Spivey THE PENGUIN BOOK OF INTERVIEWS edited by Christopher Silvester Viking, £18.99, pp. 632 I In the arena of celebrity and supercelebrity, a...

Ordering things differently David Caute CRIME AND THE ACADEMIE FRANCAISE: DISPATCHES FROM PARIS by Patrick Marnham Viking, £1l6.99, pp. 260 TIe vengeful mistress of a...

All this and heaven too Ann Geneva THE BOX OF STARS bv Catherine Tennant Chatto, £14.99, pp. 87 One of the first things I did upon arriving in Oxford to do research...

Prognosis Smith next door is sick, poor chap. If he dies, we'll have much more room to park. Connie Bensley

Books of the Year Due to postal delays, this choice of Christmas books arrives late, and the first of them is Robert Kee's life of Parnell, The Laurel and the Ivy (Hamish...

Opera Cinderella (Welsh National Opera, touring) Pink candy-floss Rupert Christiansen M\assenet's Cendrillon this is, presented in a smart new translation by Jeremy Sams. I...

Cinema CB4 | ((18', selected cinemas) I IP5 | . ('15', selected cinemas) Posse I I ('15', selected cinemas) Rapped up Mark Steyn Flans of Beverly Hills 90210, the...

High life Those were the nights Taki T New York- his is a funny time to be in the Bagel. Funny as in strange. There are high hopes that the new mayor, Rudi Giuliani, can...

qyp. l~eeiUR Trotting out the turkey ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 1 ! h.o Lj .is -t !Ai - ft idb WE ARE in the purple again, Advent is here, and Aladdin seems to have been chosen as...

SPECTATOR SPORT Royal approval Frank Keating IT WAS a nice Diary poser by Alan Rusbridger in The Spec last week. What are the Social requirements on being introduced for...