Features

This week's disgusting attack on London will naturally be seized upon by politicians of all hues to advance their various agendas. Opponents of the war in Iraq have lost no time in blaming Tony Blair and British engagement for the bombs that hit London and killed dozens and injured many hundreds. They have a point. As the Butler report revealed, the Government was explicitly warned before the Iraq war that our involvement would exacerbate the risk of terrorism in this country. But that does not for one moment mean that if Britain had not been involved in Iraq, then London would have been safe.

I have some native sympathy with the lackeys struggling to handle the Inland Revenue’s computers which, like a berserk one-arm bandit, have just spewed out an excess £1.9 billion in tax credits. I am not sure I am the best-qualified person to expound on the inadequacy of government IT systems. My own computer bears the large indelible bootprint of the Clark school of systems technology. It was imprinted a fortnight ago when the machine crashed, erasing two years’ worth of work, or at least sending it somewhere deep into the bowels of the hard drive where it could only be recovered by the kind of forensic nerds who do kiddie-porn investigations.

Roger Scruton says that France has never recovered from Jean-Paul Sartre’s horror of the bourgeoisie and his repudiation of both Christianity and the idea of France Jean-Paul Sartre, born 100 years ago on 21 June 1905, was the most striking presence in French post-war literature, and the originating cause of the left-bank culture of the Sixties. His prodigious literary gifts found expression in seminal works of philosophy, in novels, plays, stories, criticism, in a highly influential literary journal (Les Temps modernes) and in a remarkable work of autobiography (Les Mots, 1964).

Julian Morris says that aid and ‘climate control’ will make poverty perpetual Nairobi can get quite chilly in July.

Ross Clark says that the government’s PFI deals allow private companies to prosper at the public’s expense Imagine you are a left-leaning Guardian reader with a social conscience. You are not a communist, but your attitude towards private enterprise is less one of enthusiasm than grudging tolerance. If we are going to let private companies run things and make things, you believe, they must at least follow a Will Huttonesque paradigm of virtue, looking after their staff and the local community before distributing a few crumbs to their shareholders. And, of course, capitalists must be kept away from the things which really matter.

Martin Gayford examines the extraordinary lives — and deaths — of great artists and suggests that there is a link between manic depression and creativity In the summer of 1667 the architect Francesco Borromini — one of the most brilliant figures of the Italian baroque — fell into what was later described as a ‘hypochondria’, complicated by fever. ‘He twisted his mouth in a thousand horrid ways, rolled his eyes from time to time in a fearful manner, and sometimes would roar and tremble like an irate lion.’ Doctors and priests were consulted, all of whom agreed that he should never be left alone, should be prevented from working, and all efforts made to encourage him to sleep so that ‘his spirit might calm down’.