5 JUNE 1976

Page 1

Power and patronage

The Spectator

roversy over Sir Harold Wilson's resignation i tnnours has not been stilled by Lady Falkender's lette r indignant, illogical and somewhat desperate J. r to the Times, in which...

Page 3

The Week

The Spectator

An honourable settlement was at last reached in the wretched cod war, which had cost Great Britain £3 million. Under its terms tw , e ntY-four British trawlers a day will be...

Page 4

Political Commentary

The Spectator

Where are the wonder kids? John Grigg Politics is a game which is best played, as a rule, by those who start playing it young. Very few of the major figures in our political...

Page 5

Notebook

The Spectator

When Mr Michael Heseltine, bearing the Royal Mace of the House of Commons above his head, advanced on the Government benches last week, some members feared that he was about to...

Page 6

Another voice

The Spectator

Trying to be fair Auberon Waugh My reflections on the most suitable Englishman to lead his country out of its present decline were interrupted last week by a telephone call...

Page 7

Italy in serious mood

The Spectator

Richard West Milan The British Airways cabin crew on the plane „Milan were openly contemptuous of the Zseogers. 'I wish they wouldn't stand in c . ":„gangway', one steward...

Page 8

America revisited

The Spectator

Brian Inglis In 1957 the late Brad Connors of the Unite d , States Information Services rang Me UP the Spectator — I was assistant editor at th e time—to ask the name of our...

Page 11

We had fought a good fight

The Spectator

G e°rge Gale A Year ago, on 5 June 1975, we voted in the referendum on the Common Market. In rna nY ways it feels much longer ago: our concern then, whether we should stay in...

Page 13

Honour bright

The Spectator

Hugh Trevor-Roper Sir Harold Wilson has sometimes allowed himself to be compared with Mr Gladstone. There are indeed some resemblances. Both W00 Many elections and enjoyed long...

Kiss of the Whips

The Spectator

Patrick Cosgrave Two questions arise out of the ferocious rows which disfigured the proceedings of Parliament in the last week before Whitsun; and neither of them—save in one...

Page 14

Debtor's privilege

The Spectator

Andrew Alexander In conversation recently with a director of a large and well-known public company observed that what we were talking about was yet another example of the way...

Page 15

Property blighters

The Spectator

Christopher Booker Mr Peter Shore ' s decision last week not to use his powers to save the majestic eighteenth-century PLA warehouses at Cutler Street, just behind Liverpool...

Page 16

In the City

The Spectator

Cash madness Nicholas Davenport In the January number of Lloyds Bank Review Lord Kahn, whom I rate as the wisest of the old Keynesian eeonomists, remarked that the men who run...

Page 17

The 'Ey e , S ir:Icann ot agree with Christopher Booker's atta c k on Private

The Spectator

Eye. Private Eye has always far as I know, paid its own legal bills and is t he as in a perfectly correct moral posi t, he to require that costs that are due to ,.th (or to...

i nlinal libel

The Spectator

is a coincidence that Mr James Gold should be given leave to bring proE" 4 ,, ings for criminal libel against Private bc e at the same time as a similar charge was in°kught...

Scotland free?

The Spectator

Sir: It is difficult to believe that independence will create the proud, virile Scotland of Ludovic Kennedy's romantic dreams. Given the present balance between the...

What about the Tories?

The Spectator

Sir: W hat are the known facts and policies upon which Mr Geoffrey Rippon expects business leaders to speak out politically, chiding us for our failure to do so? 1 am no...

Page 18

Natural history Sir: Although I have nothing but admiration for

The Spectator

Auberon Waugh and think that he is one of the few people in the world who perceive where the sickness of our society lies and the causes thereof, I am rather worried about his...

Conferring

The Spectator

Sir: With reference to the article 'How to confer' in a recent issue: the only practical way to confer, especially between different nationalities, would be by a language that...

The Royal Academy

The Spectator

Sir: It is ironic that John McEwen should have ended his review of the Royal Academy exhibition (22 May) with an attack on Sir Basil Spence, for he reveals in his review an...

Liberty Sir: As the erosion of our traditional libel' tics

The Spectator

goes steadily on almost impercepti blY we would do well to ponder the following words of Charles Morgan in 1948: 'A man's liberty is that area of his life which his...

Page 19

Book s

The Spectator

A room with a review IChard Shone m ents of Being: Unpublished Auto- g r aPhical Writings of Virginia Woolf !cl 'tett by Jeanne Schulkind (Sussex usiniVersity Press £4.80)...

IVERACH McDONALD A Man of theTimes

The Spectator

'This book is his personal view of the last 40 years of world affairs, centred on The Times but not confined to it, and a good story it is for those with a taste of history and...

Page 20

That hard, bright flame

The Spectator

Jan Morris A Prince of Our Disorder: The Life of T. E. Lawrence John E. Mack (Waldenfeld and Nicolson £6.95) I must declare an interest, almost an involvement, in this matter....

Page 21

he

The Spectator

ck T jungle book otton th a ,, – ;! 1 Liberation Peter Singer (JonaT o w avoid mass page-turning, there is t he a."' e full stop—is a minor national joke, 4s ri:st i 411...

Page 22

The Wilde side

The Spectator

Benny Green Oscar Wilde H. Montgomery Hyde (Eyre Methuen £6.95) To write one good book about Oscar Wilde is fortunate; to write three sounds very much like greediness. Some...

Page 23

Hardly

The Spectator

Roy Fuller An indiscretion in the Life of an Heiress Thomas Hardy (Hutchinson £2.95) Hardy's first novel comes down to us as though the manuscript had, since its final...

Flying too high

The Spectator

Brigid Brophy Ernest K. Gann's Flying Circus Ernest Gann (Hodder and Stoughton £7.50) Who is Ernest K. Gann ? Critics of style will get the answer in one: a committee...

Page 24

Speak, memory

The Spectator

Harriet Waugh Monsier Proust Celeste Al baret (Harville Press £6.50) I cannot believe that Proust was quite as ghastly as this book by his housekeeper Celeste Albaret shows...

White magic

The Spectator

Richard West Cricket in a Thorn Tree: Helen Suzman and the Progressive Party Joanna Strangeways-Booth (Hutchinson During the Transvaal gold-miners strike of 1922 the local...

Page 25

Arts

The Spectator

Beckett at the Court John Spurling PProaching the Royal Court Theatre duri ng its current Beckett season, I saw a greyhaired man gripping another by both shoulders on the...

Art

The Spectator

Centre stage John McEwen Anthony Green is one of the most distinctive figurative painters at work in England today and apart from having two paintings at the Academy, of which...

Page 26

Cinema

The Spectator

Parodistic Ian Cameron The Deluge (AA) Paris Pullman Hot Times (X) Jacey On the whole, film critics do their viewing in very privileged conditions. Unlike the paying...

Page 28

Exhibition 1776

The Spectator

E. V. Gatacre The British Story of the American Revolution, or. as the posters and wall charts have it, 1776, is at the Maritime Museum, Greenwich, until 2 October (85p, 45p for...

Page 29

Ballet

The Spectator

Fine shape Michael Church When a dance company have proved their collective worth as conclusively as the Stuttgart Ballet did in their first two programmes at the. Coliseum,...

Television

The Spectator

Twin set Jeffrey Bernard Mirror on Class (2nd House, BBC 2) took a look at the way television has handled class in the past, particularly in the 'fifties. Richard Hoggart and...