Society

Friday

The Spectator

The Spectator at war: A voice from the ranks

From ‘A Voice from the Ranks’, The Spectator, 17 July 1915: [To THE EDITOR OF THE “SPECTATOR.”] Sir,—Having served in the ranks since August, allow me to say a word about “National Military Service” and the “Drink” problem. On the grounds of equity and right, the flower of our British manhood—that manhood which is now serving with the colours—cries out for National Military Service throughout the Empire. We of the rank-and-file also see for ourselves the wonderful physical development which takes place in a lad after some two or three months of military training. We note the clearer eye, the more sprightly step, we notice the “glory ” of a

Thursday

Raymond Keene

Fabulous Fabiano

Fabiano Caruana notched the result of his life at the Sinquefield Trophy in St Louis last year. Since then he has done nothing in particular and not done it very well, to adapt W.S. Gilbert’s lordly formula from Iolanthe. Now Caruana has reasserted himself at the elite tournament in Dortmund, where final scores (out of 7) were as follows: Caruana 5½, So and Nisipeanu 4, Kramnik 3½, Nepomniachtchi and Naiditsch 3, Hou Yifan and Meier 2½.   As can be seen, Caruana outclassed the field by a substantial margin, in spite of losing one game to Wesley So.   Nisipeanu-Caruana, Dortmund 2015 (see diagram 1) Black’s plan of advancing the

Raymond Keene

No. 370 | 16 July 2015

Black to play. This position is a variation from Kramnik-Naiditsch, Dortmund 2015. How can Black make a decisive material gain? Answers to me at The Spectator by Tuesday 21 July or via email to victoria@spectator.co.uk or by fax on 020 7681 3773. The winner will be the first correct answer out of a hat, and each week there is a prize of £20. Please include a postal address and allow six weeks for prize delivery. Last week’s solution 1 … Ba6 Last week’s winner Peter Durow, London W4

Peter Jones

On Wimbledon grunters

What a pleasure it was to watch the men’s final at Wimbledon contested with a minimum of grunting, exclaiming and gesticulation. Romans would have approved. It was well known that athletes and those taking exercise had a tendency to grunt. Seneca the Younger (c. 4 bc–ad 65), multi-millionaire Stoic philosopher and adviser to Nero, described his unfortunate lodgings over the baths, which made him abhor his ears: quite apart from people hawking their wares, depilators making their victims shriek, bathers singing out loud and splashing about, ‘those working out with weights — whether actually working out or just faking it — grunt away; when they let out their breath, they

The Spectator

Letters | 16 July 2015

Unions led astray Sir: Leo McKinstry’s article on the current problems in the trade unions (‘Counter-strike’, 11 July) brings back unhappy memories of the last time a similar situation arose. This was probably best known for Arthur Scargill’s attempt to use his position as head of the NUM for his own self-aggrandisment. I lived through that era and remember it well. I knew union members who were frightened of their ‘leaders’, a situation the founders of the trade union movement would have found incredible. In 1974 I attempted to transfer my union membership to a new location. Two representatives of the local branch came to see me, and were all

Taki

High life | 16 July 2015

I have signed an affidavit for a hearing in the High Court stating that Janan Harb was, to my knowledge, married to Fahd of Saudi Arabia, who later became king of that ghastly country until he ate himself to death. His son Abdul Aziz, a fat playboy who drifts around the world with an entourage of 150 bootlickers, is challenging Janan’s claims, which, in the immortal words of Mandy Rice-Davies, ‘he would, wouldn’t he?’ Saudi camel-drivers-turned-self-proclaimed royals do not like to pay for the mess they leave behind their ample posteriors, and they definitely do not like to pay for their women. (I’ve often wondered if they really think women

Jeremy Clarke

Low life | 16 July 2015

Watching the daily running of the bulls through Pamplona’s narrow streets online this week has given me a wistful pang about not being there again. I once went to Pamplona’s feria three times in four years and ran with the bulls every morning. One year I took Sharon. The day we arrived, she took one look at the streets pullulating with thousands of handsome, drunk young men and did the psychical equivalent of a graceful swallow dive into their midst. I had rented us a room in the town but she visited it only rarely and never slept there. I hardly saw her for the seven days. I should explain

Melissa Kite

Real life | 16 July 2015

Insomnia has a lot to answer for. I have not been sleeping well for years but a few months ago I stopped sleeping at all. By that I don’t mean I sleep a little bit. I mean I sleep never. And since I stopped sleeping, I have been teetering on a knife-edge. It is, I can reveal, barely possible to behave in accordance with the law if you have had no sleep for a significant time. I suspect a large proportion of the prison population just needed a sleeping pill to make them into responsible citizens. As for women’s prisons, they must be jam-packed with menopausal desperados needing HRT whose

Alexander Chancellor

Long life | 16 July 2015

I have always been what I suppose one could call a weed, and a cowardly one at that. I never liked sports and was never any good at them. When fielding at cricket at my prep school, I used to while away time making daisy-chains. Of my part in football one prep-school report merely said, to my mother’s great amusement, ‘Chancellor prefers to avoid the ball.’ At my public school, where you had to choose between rowing and cricket, I chose rowing, but only because I was just small enough to get away with being a cox, which only involved sitting in the stern of a boat and bellowing orders

Susanna Gross

Bridge | 16 July 2015

Omar Sharif did so much for bridge. He inspired countless others through his own devotion to the game (‘Acting is my living but bridge is my passion’); he promoted it around the world with his travelling ‘bridge circus’; he lent his glamour to every major tournament — even turning down films if they clashed. And he set a perfect example of gentlemanly behaviour. Zia Mahmood, one of his favourite partners, remembers that the only time Omar got cross with him was when Zia doubled the opponents in 7NT holding an ace. ‘He said the score would have been almost as good without the double — and not doubling would have

Toby Young Toby Young

Urban foxes, the ginger menace

Forget about the countryside. When is the government going to do something about the vulpine creatures wreaking havoc in central London? The situation is now so out of control, it’s time the Prime Minister convened a meeting of Cobra to discuss the ginger menace. I’m talking, of course, about the horde of SNP MPs who’ve invaded Westminster. Actually, I’m not, but I couldn’t resist that gag. No, foxes are the problem. I don’t actually keep a chicken coop in my back garden in Acton — and, for that reason, I’m spared the sight of my beloved poultry lying in a pool of blood with their heads bitten off. But I

The Spectator

Barometer | 16 July 2015

Ties that bind Lewis Hamilton was ejected from the royal box at Wimbledon for not wearing a tie. Some places he would have been welcome: — In 99 out of 100 of the most expensive restaurants surveyed in 2010. — For four evenings a week on a Cunard cruise (he would need a tie after 6 p.m. on the other three). — Driving a cab in Dubai (ties are no longer compulsory after a customer pulled one driver’s). And some places he wouldn’t: — Visiting Lloyds of London. — Competition days at Knebworth Golf Club (though socks are not usually compulsory). — Bicester Community College (ties compulsory for pupils from September).

Mary Killen

Dear Mary | 16 July 2015

Q. At a recent literary festival I attended a talk with a high-profile octogenarian writer. I had already bought her book, so I obediently queued with the others lining up to get it signed. When I reached the writer, she was exchanging a few polite words with me while signing her book (I know several members of her family) when suddenly we were interrupted by another woman coming in from the side, barging the queue and not even holding a copy of the book. She was clearly determined to show everyone that she knew the writer socially and didn’t seem to realise that her behaviour was vulgar and out of

Melvyn Bragg

Diary – 16 July 2015

I witnessed what was almost a violent fight to the death on Hampstead Heath the other morning. Broad flawless sunlight, the serenity of one of London’s greatest lungs and then, from the little pond opposite the mixed bathing pond, screams. A swan, its neck arched like a bow, yellow beak wide open, was shielding four cygnets from the splashy persistence of a determined mongrel. The swan struck, the mongrel dodged the blow. The swan swivelled and followed the attacker into the shallows, but the dog still ducked and taunted the swan. A frantic owner ran along the bank fruitlessly calling out the dog’s name. Someone — me I’m afraid —

The Spectator

Portrait of the week | 16 July 2015

Home The government postponed a Commons vote on relaxing the Hunting Act in England and Wales after the Scottish National Party said it would oppose the changes. Scottish police admitted that a crashed car off the M9, reported to them on a Sunday, was not examined until the Wednesday, when one of the two passengers inside it was still alive. She died three days later. A case of H7N7 bird flu was found at a poultry farm near Preston, Lancashire, where 170,000 chickens were slaughtered. British people were being urged by the Foreign Office to leave Tunisia because ‘a further terrorist attack is highly likely’. Up to 5,000 were flown

Dot Wordsworth

Bugs

If my husband were an insect it might well be a bug — a squat creature imbibing nutriment in liquid form. I had not taken much notice of bugs in an otherwise full life, and am surprised to learn there are nearly 2,000 species of British bugs. The point I should like to make is that the language that any one person speaks is not up to the job of labelling many things. Only a minority of those 2,000 bugs have common names. Some are named after their food (such as the box bug, which used to live only on Box Hill eating box trees, but has now taken to plums

Dumpynose

2220: Poem II

Unclued lights (two hyphened) are words (all but one of which are in ODQ) from a poem whose title appears in the completed grid. Two clued lights combine to give the poet’s surname and must be shaded.   Across   1    Brass hat beginning to eat brassica (4) 9    Gem from ring put on partner (4) 11    Break commandment, shattering true ideals (10) 13    Mademoiselle’s protest (4) 15    Clouds covering Dutch centres (6) 17    City guides in conversation (5) 18    Frost’s poems? (5) 20    Mantle’s everything one crony cherishes (7) 21    Killing time, polecats mauled mollusc (7) 24    Crest of bird part adrift (5) 25    Tower bedroom of good height

Dumpynose

To 2217: Poem

The poem was Ode on a Grecian Urn by John Keats. 1A, 16, 21A, 30, 38, 8, 13, 27, 29 and 35 all appear in it. A GRECIAN URN appears diagonally from 9. STEAK (39) was to be shaded. First prize Sid Field, Stockton-on-Tees Runners-up M. O’Hanlon, North Berwick, Scotland; Hugh Schofield, Paris

Sebastian Payne

Podcast: working with al-Qa’eda and the rise of Jeremy Corbyn

How has al-Qa’eda become the ‘moderate’ option in the Middle East? On the latest View from 22 podcast, Ahmed Rashid and Douglas Murray discuss this week’s Spectator cover feature on how a fear of Isis is leading Arab states to support the lesser of two evils. Is working with al-Qa’eda offshoots the only choice for Western countries? How significant was the decision not to bomb Syria in fighting Isis? And how does the new deal with Iran affect the West’s efforts? James Forsyth and George Eaton also discuss the momentum behind Jeremy Corbyn’s campaign to be Labour leader. Are some in the parliamentary Labour party regretting ‘loaning’ Corbyn MPs to put him on the ballot paper? How has his presence affected what the other candidates are doing? And