9 DECEMBER 1978

Page 3

European money puzzles

The Spectator

I n 1972 Parliament decided that the United Kingdom should join the European Economic Community, a decisdion endorsed three years later in a referendum. These _ecisioas were...

Page 4

Political commentary

The Spectator

Hatters' Ratters strike again Ferdinand Mount The thought processes of Mr Roy Hattersley provoke both curiosity and anxiety. What exactly is it that decides the Secretary of...

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Notebook

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Unlike the editor of the New Statesman, I did not refuse the invitation to lunch last Week with Richard Nixon. Mr Nixon may be a villain, but he is an interesting vill ain. And...

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Another voice

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A Royal Commission? Auberon Waugh Minehead, Somerset In the reporting of committal proceedings at a magistrates court, the prosecution might be expected to have a field day,...

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The Rhodesian terror

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Richard West Salisbury Are the other side in this war 'guerrillas o r terrorists'? Most foreign reporters avoid the word 'terrorist', as smacking o f government propaganda,...

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Will Namibia vote with its stomach?

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Nicholas Ashford Johannesburg Whatever else may be said about Namibia/South West Africa's first all-race elections which were taking place throughout this week, they were...

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The left in crisis

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Sam White Paris There are many reasons why the French left finds itself in a crippled state nine months after its near-victory in the March general elections, and one of the...

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Teng takes command

The Spectator

David Bonavia Hong Kong In a strange reversal of history, China's vice-premier Teng Hsiao-Ping has resorted to demagoguery to cow his political rivals and downgrade the cult of...

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Meditating for peace

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William Chislett Managua The Maharishi Mahesh Yogi might have to send some more peace reinforcements to Nicaragua if General Somoza and the °PPosition do not soon agree on a...

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Turmoil behind The Times

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Michael Cockerell Louis Heren, the Deputy Editor of The Times, is proud of his cockney origins, his long experience in. Washington and his journalistic machismo. On the night...

Page 13

Storm in a Polish tea-cup

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Marione Wallace t-I PPer-class Poles have a favourite phrase Which they whisper in semi-detached drawing rooms from Ealing to Acton ,tnatka z domu' or loosely translated, was...

Page 14

Nixon goes up to Oxford

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Peter Ackroyd When he makes a point he leans forward, as though on the verge of toppling over, and then pulls back sharply. When he tells a joke he sways from side to side,...

Page 15

A rare barminess

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Patrick Marnham S uPPosing The Times really has shut down? T hroughout the rather agreeable Dooms day capers of last week the general assump tion was that it would certainly be...

Page 16

In the City

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Market directions Nicholas Davenport On Friday last week turnover on the Stock Exchange suddenly dropped like a stone. The Queen and Prince Philip were paying an official...

A hundred years ago

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One at least, perhaps the greatest, of the many drawbacks to our civilisation, to that gradual increase in our knowledge of Nature and our command over it which we call...

Page 17

Alt Greek

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S ir: Mrs Collier (Letters, 2 December) suggests that the Parthenon frieze, together With other fifth century Greek art, is characterised by 'a thoughtful serenity, a timeless...

Actor as critic

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Sir: I wish we weren't beset by a thousand Misa pprehensions, but alas we are; the Spec(tor recently referring to Dorothy Parker's t smissal of a Broadway production: 'there's...

About Socrates I said that he and other ootable sages

The Spectator

lived in , an age 'around 500 BC'. Mrs Collier says I said, nonsensically, that Socrates was 'around in 500 BC'. Mrs ,Collier thus illustrates another point I was . Ir Ying to...

entirely ported the legend. The truth is c at on one

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side of the paper is written: 'All etans are liars' and on the other: 'I am a Reading this sort of thing in the Spectator, „,...was reminded of President Ford in a cievisiort...

Page 18

Scientology

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Sir: Your article of 25 November, 'Cults and the death wish', I find to be quite intriguing. Christopher Booker, however, I ant afraid by attempting to explain spiritual values...

Ars Poetica

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Sir: In the poem you kindly printed to celebrate the Professor of Poetry election at Oxford! omitted to include three candidates — Ronald Duncan and the two others (I forget...

Cabbies

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Sir: In the Spectator Notebook (24 November), Alexander Chancellor referred to an instance of a taxi driver who refused, illegally, to take him to his destination. In an effort...

Stoppard hemmed in

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Sir: Richard Ingrams wonders ( 2 December) whether his reaction to finding Tom Stoppard on television a bore is because he is a 'clapped-out man' or because the Bernard Levins...

Causes of inflation

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Sir: Your correspondent, M.W. Balladon (18 November) is no better at pointing oil t the causes of inflation than the contributo r he takes to task. I should have thought that...

Page 19

Christmas Books II

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Facts and fancies Christopher Booker whItakers Almanack 1979 (Whitaker Cloth 25.75; Shorter Edition 22.80; Library Edition e7.50) For more than two hundred years there have...

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High society

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Alastair Forbes Gossip Andrew Barrow (Hamish Hamilton. £10.00) The Visitor's Book Christopher Simon Sykes (Weidenfeld E12.50) Long before the date usually set aside in a once...

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Pounder

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Patrick Cosg rave Ben-Gurion Michael Bar-Zohar (Weidenfold £12.95) H ad it not been for David Ben-Gurion the state of Israel would not have been proclaimed in May, 1948. This...

Press work

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Simon Blow Thrown to the Woolfs John Lehmann (Weidenfeld E6.50) To those still harbouring dreams of Bloomsbury or the romance of publishing, John Lehmann's association with the...

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Weimar days

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Tim Garton Ash The Weimar Chronicle: Prelude to Hitler Alex de Jonge (Paddington £6.50) The New Sobriety 1917-1933: Art and Politics in the Weimar Period John Willett (Thames &...

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Dead ends

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Emma Fisher New Poetry 4: An Arts Council Anthology Fleur Adcock and Anthony Thwaite (Arts Council, Hutchinson and P.E.N. £4.50) Springtime in the Rockies Brian Marley (Trigram...

Page 25

Harplike lyrics

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Paul Potts The Collected Poems of Hugh MacDiarmid Vols I and II (Martin Brian and O'Keeffe £15) Hugh MacDiarmid, who died a few weeks ago at the age of eighty-six, was with...

Page 26

Unfinished

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Paul Ableman A Twentieth-Century Man David Benedictus (Blond & Briggs £4.95) This book has one serious fault; it is far too short. It should be at least three, and preferably...

Page 27

A golden masquerade for El Dorado

The Spectator

Marina Warner I I he Poster tells us: 'This Man is El Dorado'. I shows us an Indian wearing a fearsome flat disc in his nose and other golden regalia . and its unabashed...

Page 30

Florentine Baroque

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Charles McCorquodale The forthcoming exhibition at the Royal Academy, Painting in Florence 16001700, can claim two rather unexpected firsts: incredibly, there has never been a...

Page 32

Changing markets

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Michael Wigan Never before has the art and antique market been so much in the public eye. Apart from the startling escalation in saleroom prices, and the protest about the...

Page 34

Art stories

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John McEwen Art books are a bit like salmon: one tends to think of them in terms of poundage, of whether they are fit to be eaten (bought) or stuffed (referred to). Some — very...

Page 35

Hogarth's satirical brush

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Benny Green Hogarth is something of a special case among English painters, a great artist who often used his genius as a means to an end rather than as an end in itself. For...

Page 36

Abstract prizes

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John McEwen It is a typical anomaly of British art that the most important painting competition it has to offer takes place biannually in Liverpool. There, to his eternal...

Page 38

In place of strife

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Peter Jenkins Strife (Olivier) The Machine Wreckers ((Half Moon) In a century whose shattering discovery has been that the abolition of capitalism is incompatible with the...

Cinema

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Art movie Ted Whitehead Interiors (Cinecenta) For two years, reviewing theatre o f cinema, I've managed to avoid the us e ,,, e the word 'Art', because I believe that word has...

Page 39

Television

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Generations Richard Ingrams The most baffling sight in recent days was, that of the undergraduates at the Oxford Union rising to their feet to give an ovation to Richard...

Page 40

High life

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Clubland Taki New York The disco war of New York heated up and exploded this week. The three major powers of disco — Studio 54, Xenon and Regine's, each using the same battle...

Low life

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Back again Jeffrey Bernard By the time you read these nervous lines I will have committed yet another act of gross folly. I will have addressed the sixth form of Sevenoaks...

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Last word

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As Wini said Geoffrey Wheatcroft Oral history is notoriously unreliable and deceiving. Everyone's memory plays tricks. The more are the memories involved, the 10 0 re does...