were arrested by police investigating terrorism; the arrests were in north-west London; Bushey, Hertfordshire; Luton, Bedfordshire and Blackburn, Lancashire. Separate plans by...

L isten hard and you can hear J. Bonington-Jagworth grumbling loudly. The Association of London Government has announced that it is to fine motorists up to £100 a time for...

let us avoid the appalling new practice of requiring children to give testimonials on behalf of their parents. I was sitting with my 11-year-old daughter in our VIP suite in...

G ood news for papermakers, security printers and the Post Office: companies' annual reports and accounts are all set to grow fatter still. Their bulk has already trebled in a...

T he other day someone asked _ me what the story of SvenGoran Eriksson. the Football Association and the girl was all about. I hesitated. I thought that I understood it — and...

Stop moaning, says Michael Hanlon. Forget global warming and health scares. We live in the happiest, healthiest and most peaceful era in human history T he world is, we are told...

Shakespeare invented the words anchovy, well-ordered, worm-hole and zany. Or did he? I've been nagged at the back of my mind (a tender spot) by doubts about Shakespeare ever...

Jonathan Freedland says he still loves the Land of the Free even though he detests the present administration here are few vices a left-leaning liberal cannot admit to these...

Britain has no reason to apologise to Poland, says Simon Heifer: we could not have helped the resistance fighters during the Warsaw uprising T he Polish Prime Minister, Marek...

When Plato writes about education, he comes up with a brilliant image of the master-pupil relationship: 'After a long partnership in a common life, truth flashes on the soul...

Daniel Wolf believes it unlikely that armed intervention can bring justice to Sudan I f there is a crisis in a remote place, and governments, newspapers and aid agencies start...

Judge not that ye be not judgmental, for in making a judgment you commit the worst, indeed the only, possible sin in an age of tolerance. This, perhaps, is the modern equivalent...

Celia Walden says that the evangelical Alpha course makes the rich and beautiful feel good about themselves and provides them with a dating agency T he chances are that if...

Peter Hitchens says that allowing secret abortions for minors mocks the rule of law, and adds to the corruption of national life T here has seldom been a time , when...

Singapore A lbert Cheng is Hong Kong's most popular radio chatshow host. Or, at least, he was. Last week he was sacked by his employers, Commercial Radio, for what they...

From Dr Robert Huddart Sir: Brendan O'Neill in his article 'What a load of b4 , 114

From Rosemary Thorpe Sir: William J. Abbott says that Christianity 'is on its way to becoming a dead religion' (Letters, 31 July). I am sick and tired of this sort of thing. In...

From Barbara Davies Sir: [agree with much of Ross Clark's article (`The terror war we can win', 31 July). We certainly need to win this battle to safeguard the vital and...

From John Kenwonhy-Browne Sir: Pace Paul Johnson (And another thing, 31 July) and other critics, the primary meaning of 'fountain' is not jet, but a spring or source of water;...

From Desmond Fit2Patrick Sir: In his review of Posh (Books, 31 July) Digby Durrant himself is somewhat at sixes and sevens in attributing the origin of that expression to the...

T he most interesting play on in London at the moment is The Old Masters at the Comedy Theatre. Simon Gray has written a drama about the conflict between commerce and idealism...

T he previously most famous resident of Notting Hill, now publicised as possessing its own Tory 'set', must have been John Reginald Halliday Christie, who emerged after the...

Frederic Raphael EDGE OF MIDNIGHT THE LIFE OF JOHN SCHLESINGER by William J. Mann Hutchinson, £25, pp. 628, ISBN 0091794897 D irecting movies is more like a sport than an art:...

D. J. Taylor ALCHEMY by Maureen Duffy Fourth Estate, £15.99, pp. 380, ISBN 0007149654 T here never were any flies on Maureen Duffy. Like her nearcontemporary Francis King,...

Nigel Spivey HISTORY AND THE MEDIA edited by David Cannadine Palgrave, £19.99, pp. 175, ISBN 1403920370 T he main lesson of history is that we do not learn the lessons of...

Raymond Carr THE SHADOW OF THE WIND by Carlos Ruiz Zafon Weidenfeld & Nicolson, £12.99, pp. 403, ISBN 029784752X C arlos Ruiz Zafon's novel has won a clutch of literary prizes...

Christopher Howse PILGRIMAGE TO THE END OF THE WORLD by Conrad Rudolph University of Chicago Press, £21, pp. 131, ISBN 0226731251 A. 12th-century eyewitness at Santiago de...

David Crane THE EXILED COLLECTOR by Anne Sebba John Murray; £22.50, pp. 308, ISBN 0719563283 I f any of Byron's contemporaries at Cambridge had been asked to nominate The Man...

Jonathan Keates FROM THE LOWER EAST SIDE TO HOLLYWOOD: JEWS IN AMERICAN POPULAR CULTURE by Paul Buhle Verso. 116, pp. 304, ISBN 1859845983 i nNew York in 1920 the writer Hattie...

great trickster Graham Greene continues to cause trouble. The small press Hesperus has been forced to cancel its publication of a Greene novella called No Man's Land. Enclosed...

Stephen Pettitt finds that chamber music is not the only attraction in Risor F or 13 years now, the tiny fishing village of Risor in southern Norway has played host to a...

Andrew Lambirth Making Faces Sunley Room, National Gallery, until 26 September W itty titles for exhibitions about portraiture are the order of the day. Over at the Hayward...

Toby Young A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum Olivier Guantanamo New Ambassadors Fully Committed Menier Chocolate Factory' A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the...

Michael Tanner Luisa Miller Opera Holland Park I n the course of Verdi's long, slow, battling progress towards eventual greatness, there are few works as weird in their...

Robin Holloway N ewOrleans; Mardi Gras: stereotypes and expectations accumulated down the years change and pale confronted by a first experience of the actuality. Hitting the...

Peter Phillips rrhe traditional and continuing isolation 1. of Britain in Europe is a fact of life which the annual round of summer musicfestivalling brings into sharp focus....

Mark Steyn Thunderbirds (PG, selected cinemas) y ou have a tough choice at your local Roxy this week: you can go and see Spider-Man 2, which is a superb example of how to...

Ursula Buchan r e daily walk I take in the countryside oses something of its pleasure in June and July. The sight of numerous small trees in the roadside hedgerows, with their...

Michael Vestey Mhe diaries of King George V turned out to be as brisk, uncomplicated and dull as the man himself, judging by the extracts broadcast last week. In Book of the...

Simon Heifer B y the time Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger came to make The Small Back Room in 1948-49 they had acquired a reputation as the most adventurous, imaginative...

Taki Sr Tropez S urnmer is supposedly a time when you can leave behind the cares of the world, a vision of the good life, a back-to-nature period after the barbarities of the...

Jeremy Clarke S tansted to Cork. Flight full. I'm into the second day of a bout of food poisoning and staring at the bottom of a Ryanair sick bag. (Ryanair sick bags are...

Petronella Wyatt I was lunching with some friends the other day (I don't lunch for every column, incidentally, but these happened to be friends from abroad whom I hadn't seen...

FRANK KEATING I had been ploughing on at my desk in the usual desultory way a couple of weeks ago, tootling out some tripe to greet the start of the new soccer season — already...

delights of Daymer Bay in Cornwall, a meeting-ground renowned for its nightly teenage public-school gatherings. I am somewhat nervous as I do not smoke, and most of my friends...

clothing is concerned I am quite good at finding substitutes. What should I say when, at a party, people admire, for example, my Trada' shirt, which in reality comes from Zara?...

stay with some friends at their home in Provence. Subsequently I received what is known in some circles as a considerably better invitation, to stay with mutual friends who live...