Book review – autobiography
In Fleet Street’s fast lane
In her early days on Fleet Street, Mary Kenny, as she herself admits, was cast as ‘the wild Irish girl’,…
Those little grey cells in operation
In the first sentence of the first chapter of this book, Henry Marsh, a consultant brain surgeon, says, ‘I often…
Small wars in academe
It’s a misleading title, because there is nothing unexpected about Professor Carey, in any sense. He doesn’t turn up to…
No dumb waiter
Comedians always like to claim that they started making jokes after childhoods made harsh by poverty; that at a formative…
The curiosity in the cabinet
John Biffen was mentally ill. This is the outstanding revelation of Semi-Detached, a memoir which has been assembled from his…
Captain courageous
Andrew Strauss is a serious man and Driving Ambition (Hodder, £20, Spectator Bookshop, £18) is a serious book. It looks…
