Spectator articles from June 2006

Spectator archives from June 2006

A government of Neros.(John Prescott)
June 3, 2006... John Prescott has always claimed to be one of the unacknowledged founders of New Labour. It is certainly true that he took an early lead in modernising the party's structure, championing the Private Finance Initiative and the coining of...

HRH PRINCESS MICHAEL OF KENT.
June 3, 2006... To Venice for the opening of Franois Pinault's museum in the Palazzo Grassi, now showing part of his extraordinary modern art collection. For some reason France rejected the collection, saying that there was no suitable venue. Some say it was a...

Alan Johnson is the Labour leader that Cameron's Conservatives fear.
June 3, 2006... I got the shock of my life the other day. Recording a programme called What Is Right? for Radio Four, Norman Tebbit, that pitiless scourge of touchyfeely tree-hugging modernisers, went out of his way to agree with what I had said. ...

THE SPECTATOR'S NOTES.
June 3, 2006... As a political scandal rolls on, people always seem to fasten on the wrong reason why the minister concerned should resign. It is surely good news that John Prescott and his team were playing croquet at Dorneywood on a Thursday afternoon. What...

DIARY OF A NOTTING HILL NOBODY.
June 3, 2006... MONDAY Dave is en famille and not to be disturbed unless it's urgent DIDs (Desert Island Discs) fallout, which means Mr Hague is in charge. Officially. Unofficially, DD keeps ringing up and tasking us with impossible demands. He may as...

The Home Office vs the Treasury:the Brown and Reid clans go to war.
June 3, 2006... When John Reid was appointed Home Secretary last month, his staff presented him with a rather macabre gift: a league table of the shortest-serving secretaries of state in the department's 225-year history. With each passing week he could...

'Never be terrible in a terrible movie'.(Christopher Lee)(Interview)
June 3, 2006... The waiters at Le Caprice in St James's have never had to go out to see the world. The world has always come to them. Just after the war, Humphrey Bogart used to dine at the ineffably glamorous establishment with Lauren Bacall and, since then,...

No wonder the neo-Nazis salute Iran's President.
June 3, 2006... Hjalmar Schacht, the Nazi economics minister, had many unusual interests but one was especially telling. He was fascinated with the theory, famously enunciated by King Darius the Great, that the Persians were of Aryan lineage, and argued that...

Grammar schools are liberal, Mr Cameron.
June 3, 2006... Listening to messed-up thinking about education was, I used to assume, an occupational hazard of being an adopted north London liberal. It was part of the deal, I figured, to hear out friends and acquaintances - all otherwise good, sane, clever...

Ancient & modern.
June 3, 2006... The new baths in Roman Bath may open at some point in the next millennium, but they will bear no relation to the real thing. Public baths were the Romans' leisure-and-relaxation centres, built wherever the legions stationed themselves...

Why I asked Bush about his mistakes in Iraq.
June 3, 2006... Washington Even on Memorial Day, when the fallen are honoured, it seemed impossible to comprehend the reality of Iraq in what Americans refer to reverentially as 'our nation's capital'. A wave of suicide bombs hit Baghdad, killing 40 and...

There are one or two things I have to confess about hen nights.(hen nights)(Column)
June 3, 2006... What follows is meant not so much to defend my responses as to question them. Nor would I detain you with this were it not true that most of us men respond similarly. I think the problem is probably our problem - and wonder whether...

Two kinds of don.(Letter to the editor)
June 3, 2006... From Joseph Palley Sir: Boris Johnson laments the declining quality of British universities, with growth in student numbers outpacing funding ('Farewell to the Young Ones', 27 May). The problem is not just financial but cultural. It...

Our party piece.(Letter to the editor)
June 3, 2006... From Alex Bannister Sir: Charles Moore (The Spectator's Notes, 27 May) should perhaps have checked with his fellow Telegraph columnists before launching into his latest diatribe against the Daily Mail. He attacks our report on the Beckhams'...

Amnesty and abortion.(Letter to the editor)
June 3, 2006... From Kate Allen Sir: The debate on abortion is a difficult one to have ('If Amnesty declares the "right to kill", it will kill itself', 27 May), but, with proponents of differing views invoking human rights in their arguments, it's not...

Ignorance was bliss.(Letter to the editor)
June 3, 2006... From John Bunyard Sir: Rod Liddle's attribution of unhappiness to a surfeit of choice ('Profusion of choice makes us unhappy', 27 May) is imaginative, if difficult to prove empirically: those who lived through the no-choice command economy of...

The art of chairmanship.(David Jones)(Interview)
June 3, 2006... 'We all have different ways of doing things, ' says David Jones, when I ask him what makes a good captain of a corporate ship. He certainly has his own way of preparing for a high-pressure day like the one he had last week at the annual general...

My top tip: buy a time machine.(investment)(Column)
June 3, 2006... About this time last month I was at a party at The Spectator, drunkenly urging anyone who'd listen to buy into this amazing share I'd discovered called Tullow Oil. I'd done exceptionally well by this little gem over the last 12 months and I...

Buy one pension, get one free.
June 3, 2006... Imagine, for a moment, that you have a pension pot worth [pounds sterling]100,000 in government securities, and its value goes up by [pounds sterling]10,000. Are you better off or worse off? Well, ask a silly question, and you'll get a stupid...

The greenmailing of corporate Britain.
June 3, 2006... This year's corporate colour is green. Even Rupert Murdoch has placed a lime tint over the screens at BSkyB, declaring it to be the first carbon-neutral media company. Anyone with a portfolio of shares is already aware of this year's...

Portrait of the invisible man.(Flaubert)(Book review)
June 3, 2006... FLAUBERT by Frederick Brown Heinemann, [pounds sterling]25, pp. 628, ISBN 0434007692 Any biographer of Flaubert is faced with a fundamental irony: he or she will be writing the personal life of the literary high priest of the doctrine of...

Sermon.(Poem)
June 3, 2006... Out of the darkness and the bouillabaisse of nebulae and swirling gas we come, out of the toxic argon wilderness, seeking a sanctuary and a home. Be kind. Love one another. The frogs are dying. The old copper beech festers in acid...

A tapestry's rich life.(The Bayeux Tapestry)(Book review)
June 3, 2006... THE BAYEUX TAPESTRY by Carola Hicks Chatto, [pounds sterling]25, pp. 358, , ISBN 0701174633 . [pounds sterling]20 (plus [pounds sterling]2.45 p&p) 0870 429 6655 The Bayeux tapestry records pictorially in a series of 56 panels, stretching...

Toughing it out together.(American Ally: Tony Blair and the War on Terror)(Book review)
June 3, 2006... AMERICAN ALLY : TONY BLAIR AND THE WAR ON TERROR by Con Coughlin Politico's, [pounds sterling]18.99, pp. 419, ISBN 1842751603 . [pounds sterling]15.19 (plus [pounds sterling]2.45 p&p) 0870 429 6655 Since the Suez debacle, the chemistry...

Anxieties on and off the stage.(Telling Some Tales)(Book review)
June 3, 2006... TELLING SOME TALES by Anna Massey Hutchinson, [pounds sterling]17.99, pp. 259, ISBN 0091796458 . [pounds sterling]14.39 (plus [pounds sterling]2.45 p&p) 0870 429 6655 On the face of it the actress Anna Massey's life would seem to have been...

Fragments of village life.(Alentejo Blue)(Book review)
June 3, 2006... ALENTEJO BLUE by Monica Ali Doubleday, [pounds sterling]14.99, pp. 297, ISBN 9780385604864 . [pounds sterling]11.99 (plus [pounds sterling]2.45 p&p) 0870 429 6655 Brick Lane, Monica Ali's first novel, sold a great many copies and was...

The art of the matter.(Theft: A Love Story)(Book review)
June 3, 2006... THEFT : A LOVE STORY by Peter Carey Faber, [pounds sterling]16.99, pp. 260, ISBN 0571231470 Peter Carey's ropy, visceral prose casts a powerful spell. It has a swarming, improvised quality which besieges and easily overwhelms objections,...

Jack the lad.(Column)
June 3, 2006... 'Coming out' had a different meaning in 1938 to what it has today. Nearly 70 years ago the London Season followed much the same pattern as it had before the first world war. For a small section of people there were three frantic months of...

One who got away.(In the Bunker with Hitler)(Book review)
June 3, 2006... IN THE BUNKER WITH HITLER by Bernd Freytag von Loringhoven, with Franois d'Alenon Weidenfeld, [pounds sterling]12.99, pp. 207, ISBN 0297845551 Rather late, we have here the recollections of a then young German army staff officer, who saw...

A late beginner.(Alfred Duggan)(Critical essay)
June 3, 2006... Sometimes at book festivals I am asked which historical novelists I most admire and enjoy. 'Alfred Duggan, ' I say first, and am usually met with a blank response. This is not entirely surprising. Duggan died in 1964 and most of his books are...

Beyond the fringe.
June 3, 2006... Surrealism is in the air, what with the Hayward and Max Ernst shows (reviewed in these pages last week), and it's been lurking around in a different guise since April in an enthralling show at the Whitechapel which focuses on Outsider Art....

Birds and buoys.
June 3, 2006... Nigel Hughes: Maritime Still Life Paintings St Barbe Art Gallery, Lymington, until 10 June Curassows, Guans and Chachalacas The Fine Art Society, from 7 to 22 June You learn something every day, so the saying goes, though these days it...

Uplifting thrills.(Fidelio)(Opera review)
June 3, 2006... Fidelio Barbican The Mariinsky Theatre Opera Birmingham Fidelio, Beethoven's simple and sublime opera, presupposes a belief in a set of values and their connection with action which it is hard for most of us to accept, possibly even to take...

Young triumphs.(Living with War)(Sound recording review)
June 3, 2006... This column is in disgrace. Last month, with both the deadline and a flight to New York looming, I found myself in the position of the rabbit staring at the headlights of the oncoming lorry. Completely frozen, unable to think, unable to write....

Past tense.(United 93)(Movie review)
June 3, 2006... United 93 15, selected cinemas As I'm sure you are aware, United Airlines' Flight 93 was the fourth plane hijacked on 9/11 - the one that did not reach its target. I shall ignore the internet-based argument over what happened to United 93...

Magic moments.(Sleeping Beauty)(Dance review)
June 3, 2006... Rambert Dance Company Sadler's Wells Theatre Sleeping Beauty Royal Opera House One of the many strengths of Rambert Dance Company is excellent programming. Look, for instance, at the triple bill presented last week at Sadler's Wells, an...

And the choir sings on.(choir schools)
June 3, 2006... Killing time in Beverley Minster the other day I caught sight of the list of past organists painted up on a board. Within the past 200 years this magnificent building, which has no choir-school of its own, has played host to John Camidge,...

First and last loves.(Antony and Cleopatra)(Romeo and Juliet)(Theater review)
June 3, 2006... Antony and Cleopatra Swan Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon Romeo and Juliet Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford-uponAvon In my first report (13 May) from the front line of the RSC's Complete Works festival, I praised a visiting German...

Special effect.(Test Match Special)(Radio program review)
June 3, 2006... Mention of the late Brian Johnston in last week's column about his Down Your Way programmes reminded me of the loss his death was to Test Match Special on Radio Four long wave, or at least what I then feared would be a great loss. Although...

Howembarrassing.(The Summer of . . . Love, 1967)(Television program review)
June 3, 2006... The Summer of . . . Love, 1967 (BBC2, Saturday) was the first in a series about famous summers. Golly, it was cringemaking. It took the celebrated era entirely on its own terms, or else on the terms laid down by the tabloid press, neither of...

Thinking big.(horse racing)
June 3, 2006... Watching the woman in front of me in the Ascot Tote queue backing five horses in the same race on Saturday reminded me of Lloyd Bentsen, one of the best US politicians never to become president, who died last week. Asked once if it wasn't...

Lament for a learned friend.(Yohannes Goulandris)(Obituary)
June 3, 2006... Athens On a sad trip to Athens for my friend Yanni Goulandris's funeral. Throughout the years, mostly in these pages, I have always referred to him as Professor Yohannes Goulandris, mind you, mostly to annoy him. Yanni did not think...

Little gods.(Column)
June 3, 2006... At the weekend my brother and his wife plus children and terriers came to stay. My brother is a large rugby-playing policeman. His wife, also an agent of law and order, is something high up in the drugs squad. The children, a boy aged seven and...

One step from paradise.(village life)(Column)
June 3, 2006... I was brought up in a vanishing village. It did not disappear overnight under the waters of a reservoir. Nor was it suddenly deserted on the orders of the Ministry of Defence. Wadsley was slowly submerged under owner-occupation. Our house - bow...

The bare facts.(bikinis)(Column)
June 3, 2006... The first grown-up I saw with no clothes on was Bridget Bardot. It was 1962 and my brother Adam and I were staying in the small fishing village of St Tropez. We were mucking about, looking through our binoculars at all the boats. Suddenly we...

ITSY-BITSY BIKINIS.
June 3, 2006... Melissa Odabash Palermo red bikini Price: [pounds sterling]105 Stockists: 020 7235 5000 www. odabash. com Heidi Klein St Tropez Aubergine bikini Price: [pounds sterling]135 Stockists: 020 7259 9418 www. heidiklein. com

The fine lines of beauty.
June 3, 2006... It's just as well that 50 is the new 40. In the West we live and work in such an ageist, youth-obsessed society that panic seems to set in at the first sight of a wrinkle. Given that the government has now decreed that women can't retire...

BEAUTY IN A BOTTLE.
June 3, 2006... Clinique Advanced Stop Signs Cream Price: [pounds sterling]35 for 50ml Stockists: 0870 034 2566 www. clinique. co. uk Dior Capture R60/80 Filler Price: [pounds sterling]42.50 Stockists: 01932 233 909 Clarins Moisture Quenching Hydra...

Rule Britannia.(Column)
June 3, 2006... My favourite destination is a cosy little spot which goes by the name of 'G', only men can never find it. Otherwise, Anguilla is my place of pleasure. This Caribbean island is Britain's neglected paradise, mainly enjoyed by French and...

HOTELS OF THE WEEK.
June 3, 2006... CAP JULUCA PO Box 240, Maundays Bay, Anguilla, Leeward Islands, British West Indies Tel: 001 (264) 497 6666; Fax: 001 (264) 497 6617 www. capjuluca. com MALLIOUHANA HOTEL AND SPA PO Box 173, Meads Bay, Anguilla, British West Indies Tel:...

Mad about the boys.(World Cup soccer)
June 3, 2006... In the euphorically barmy delusions of upcoming World Cup invincibility - the English never used to be so insanely carried away when their teams even had a real chance of winning the ruddy thing - I was taken by one nicely observant line on how...

Water, water, everywhere.
June 10, 2006... The emergency water-rationing measures now affecting 13 million people across the southeast have rekindled memories of the last serious drought to afflict the country, in 1976. Britain in many ways is an unrecognisable country from the Britain...

DIARY.
June 10, 2006... Researching the dead can feel like being buried alive with them. After months spent with manuscripts and dusty books about the 16th century I even look like a corpse. But this week I am taking a heart-stimulating trip to Manhattan. I am giving...

Cameron is right to be sceptical of the polls: he does not want to be the Tory Kinnock.
June 10, 2006... After more than a decade of intellectual struggle, the Conservatives have finally made a political breakthrough over the National Health Service. Last month, when a thousand people were asked which party was 'putting forward the best health...

THE SPECTATOR'S NOTES.
June 10, 2006... Although we send 250 police in search of possible terrorists in east London, our government takes a completely opposite attitude to the subject whenever it's Irish. After the IRA was involved in the murder of Robert McCartney and the robbery of...

DIARY OF A NOTTING HILL NOBODY.
June 10, 2006... MONDAY Exhausted. Have ploughed through nearly 30 pages (a record for me) of our 500-page briefing on Gideon's speech and I'm still no wiser. Are we going to cut taxes or not? Call me a 'Thatcherite' (banned word in the new pocket Book of Dave...

Darfur's terrible export: the riders of death who are pouring into Chad.
June 10, 2006... Peter Oborne reports from the battlefield on the Chad-Sudan border where Janjaweed bandits, armed with AK-47s, grenades and helicopter gunships, are ethnically cleansing local African tribesmen Adre, Chad When we visited the scene of...

A don who embodies the idea of a university.(Jeremy Catto)
June 10, 2006... Alan Duncan pays tribute to Jeremy Catto, the mediaeval historian and legendary Oxford tutor - but doubts that today's dons will carry on his glorious tradition Sir John Betjeman gripped the sword and, with great gusto, sliced through the...

Labour's 'trust tsar' sets out his stall for life after Blair.(Jack Straw)(Interview)
June 10, 2006... Jack Straw tells Matthew d'Ancona about his plans for the Lords, party funding and the royal prerogative, and says that 'Tony will go well before the next election' For a man supposedly humiliated by his move last month from the Foreign...

The truth is that Europe is America's poodle.
June 10, 2006... David Rennie says that Brussels has been craven in its compliance with US demands for up to 34 pieces of data on each passenger heading for an American destination Brussels If there is one thing Brussels does not lack, it is people who...

Polygamy is just the legal term for having affairs.(Big Love)(Television program review)
June 10, 2006... Melissa Kite is glued to the screen by the US smash-hit series 'Big Love' - about to be shown here - and is gripped by the controversy it has triggered over multiple marriage Fifteen minutes into the first episode of Big Love, an American...

Schools for success.(Letter to the editor)
June 10, 2006... Sir: Robert Yates rightly explains that grammar schools were the path to academic success and a good job for clever workingclass children in the period 1935 to 1975 ('Grammar schools are liberal, Mr Cameron', 3 June). To these should be added...

Roy's rural ride.(Letter to the editor)
June 10, 2006... Sir: While enjoying Roy Hattersley's bucolic rhapsodies (Life, 3 June) and wishing him well in his village Arcadia, I was reminded of those contemporary architects who proselytise modernism but opt to live in mellow Georgian rectories. As...

Tolerance of the Kurds.(Letter to the editor)
June 10, 2006... Sir: Charles Moore worries, with some justification, about the vulnerability of Christians in such places as Iraq (The Spectator's Notes, 3 June). He would have been pleased, though, to have met, as I did a week ago, the head of the security...

Good news for Dugganites.(Letter to the editor)
June 10, 2006... Sir: Allan Massie's advocacy of Alfred Duggan (Books, 3 June) is greatly welcomed. As Duggan's recently retired literary agent, I can assure Mr Massie that several of the novels should no longer be out of print. Phoenix Press (which took...

Wind instrument.(Letter to the editor)
June 10, 2006... Sir: Christopher Caldwell in his piece 'Why I, as an American, love the French' (27 May) says, 'Little of [French] wit involves breaking wind on trains.' Perhaps so. But may I remind him that there was, in the late 19th or early 20th century, a...

We should be told whether Ernie the milkman would make the Tory A-list.(David Cameron)
June 10, 2006... Mr Cameron's feat in attracting Ernie, the most famous milkman in the history of the British dairy industry, to the Conservative cause could prove as bold as his winning over the help of the equally controversial Bob Geldof. But it is also...

The misleading dimensions of persons and lives.
June 10, 2006... Iam disquietingly conscious of feeling smaller than I was; relatively, that is. For most of my life, being six foot one, I have loomed over the majority of men and almost all women. Now, at the local Sainsbury's, where queues are constant...

An insatiable appetite for art.
June 10, 2006... Joanna Pitman says money from Russia and Wall Street is fuelling saleroom fever. But how long can the bull run last? Never in living memory has there been so much interest in buying art as there is now. Across all categories, from Old...

Humbugs, scallywags, hustlers and fools.(art market)
June 10, 2006... If a bull market can turn a moron into a genius, the art market deserves government funding. It has done for the elite what the housing boom has done for the lumpen. They all think they deserve a Nobel Prize. What a delight for the...

Watch those figures, girls!
June 10, 2006... Nicola Horlick says women will soon be richer than men, and should learn to look after their money When divorce is cited as a fast track to becoming rich, it's time to pay attention. Even before the law lords' recent controversial...

Hot stocks and naughty boys.(stock market)
June 10, 2006... Matthew Vincent says that London's colourful junior stock market can offer tax breaks and high returns What do the following have in common: metatarsally challenged footballing wonderkid Wayne Rooney, two-time-Asheswinning spin bowler Phil...

Why the economy and the stock market are always out of step.
June 10, 2006... John Maynard Keynes used to say that he hoped being an economist would one day be deemed as respectable and useful as being a dentist. It obviously did not bother Keynes that this parallel might conjure up, for most people, a nightmarish...

Hank the Tank's answer to America's deficit: more prayer, less healthcare.
June 10, 2006... The markets are jumpy, the dollar is tired, and Alan Greenspan has sunk below the horizon. Now more than ever the dollar needs a top-class spokesman, and in Hank the Tank it may have found one. Henry Paulson, boss of Goldman Sachs, lion of...

The view ahead through the windscreen.(The Book of Dave)(Book review)
June 10, 2006... THE BOOK OF DAVE by Will Self Penguin, [pounds sterling]17.99, pp. 495, ISBN 9780670914432 . [pounds sterling]14.39 (plus [pounds sterling]2.45 p&p) 0870 429 6655 Most literary versions of the remote future are dystopias; they are not, of...

Hard acts to follow.(Lion's Honey: The Myth of Samson)(Book review)
June 10, 2006... LION 'SHONEY : T HEMYTH OF SAMSON by David Grossman Canongate, [pounds sterling]12.99, pp. 159, ISBN 1841956562 . [pounds sterling]10.39 (plus [pounds sterling]2.45 p&p) 0870 429 6655 At a time when Israel was under the rule of the...

The slow poison of praise.(Orson Welles: Hello Americans)(Book review)
June 10, 2006... ORSON WELLES : H ELLO AMERICANS by Simon Callow Cape, [pounds sterling]25, pp. 507, ISBN 0224038532 . [pounds sterling]20 (plus [pounds sterling]2.45 p&p) 0870 429 6655 More than 60 years after its release, Citizen Kane still regularly...

A meeting of true minds.(The Elements of Lavishness: Letters of Sylvia Townsend Warner and William Maxwell )(Book review)
June 10, 2006... THE ELEMENT OF LAVISHNESS : LETTERS OF SYLVIA TOWNSEND WARNER AND WILLIAM MAXWELL , 1938-1978 edited by Michael Steinman Counterpoint, [pounds sterling]13.50, pp. 356, ISBN 1582432473 To order, tel: 01235 465521, or email: direct....

Little time for Proust or Tolstoy.(With Borges)(Book review)
June 10, 2006... WITH BORGES by Alberto Manguel Telegram, 26 Westbourne Grove, London W2 5RH, tel: 020 7229 2911, email: orders@telegrambooks. com, [pounds sterling]6.99, pp. 77, ISBN 1846590051 Alberto Manguel is the notoriously well-read international man...

The dangerous edge of things.(Wild Mary)(Book review)
June 10, 2006... WILD MARY by Patrick Marnham Chatto & Windus, [pounds sterling]18.99, pp. 352, ISBN 0701179910 . [pounds sterling]15.19 (plus [pounds sterling]2.45 p&p) 0870 429 6655 If her name rings a bell at all, Mary Wesley, who died aged 90 in 2002,...

The incredible journey.(Miracle in the Andes)(Book review)
June 10, 2006... MIRACLE IN THE ANDES by Nando Parrado Orion, [pounds sterling]16.99, pp. 274, ISBN 0752871936 . [pounds sterling]13.59 (plus [pounds sterling]2.45 p&p) 0870 429 6655 You probably know the story: in October 1972, a privately chartered plane...

Rhythm and blues.(Everyman)(Book review)
June 10, 2006... EVERYMAN by Philip Roth Cape, [pounds sterling]10, pp. 182 ISBN 9780224078690 . [pounds sterling]8 (plus [pounds sterling]2.45 p&p) 0870 429 6655 Nothing much to report here, no news and no surprises: dog bites man; Philip Roth writes...

The devil in the detail.(The Year of Henry)(Book review)
June 10, 2006... THE YEAR OF HENRY by David Lodge Harvill/Secker, [pounds sterling]18.99, pp. 332, ISBN 1846550033 JAMES The Year of Henry James, which gives its title to David Lodge's book, is 2004. During that year Lodge published Author, Author and Colm...

Musical chairs.(Daniel Barenboim)
June 10, 2006... Daniel Barenboim leaves Chicago next weekend. Michael Henderson looks to the future Daniel Barenboim, one of the most celebrated musicians of the age, conducts the Chicago Symphony, one of the most distinguished of all orchestras, for the...