High life

New York One felt the backlash against the BNP–BBC fiasco all the way to the Big Bagel, with local papers commenting on the lynching of Nick Griffin by rent-a-crowd minorities. Even people who think England is in Canada heard about it and called the freak show unfair and stage-managed, confirming the perception that Britain is a nation that has totally lost its way. Personally, I wasn’t surprised in the least. Dimbleby is a pompous clown, Jack Straw a mincing shyster of a man posing as a leader of men, and Griffin is, well, Griffin: it is the unbearable picking on the unsuitable. I particularly liked the scenes outside the BBC, where wild, hairy ethnic types with bandanas screamed abuse at the police and at everyone and no one in particular.

New York Something’s bothering me about the Polanski business. No, unlike Harvey Weinstein and Bernard-Henri Lévy — not to mention that Mitterrand paedophile — I will not defend Roman’s actions with a 13-year-old, but I will say that, with friends like his making fools of themselves defending him, it will be a miracle if he gets off with a slap on the wrist. Although this may sound pompous, I doubt if any of his defenders have known Polanski as long as I have — 40 years and counting — but let’s take it from the top. What Hugo Rifkind wrote about him and his defenders in these pages on 3 October is spot-on. Hollywood has a lot to answer for, and mixing up global warming, Darfur, HIV and Roman’s case is not exactly kosher.

New York When A Moveable Feast was published in 1964 I had been living in Paris for six years. I was 27 and in love with Papa Hemingway’s favourite city, one that he described as ‘a mistress who always has new lovers’. One didn’t speak this way back then, but the book really blew my mind. Totally. Papa had died three years before that, and reading his obituaries I had decided to follow the writing life, despite the fact that I had failed English at school and — according to my father — was incapable of writing a coherent letter asking for money. Obituaries have a tendency to concentrate the mind.

New York They founded this place 400 years ago this year among the Indians in the marshes, and no one’s looked back since. Some of the Dutch descendants are still around but you wouldn’t know it by reading the gossip columns or celebrity blogs. This is immigrant paradise, and the less European one looks and sounds the better. It’s the nominally post-racial New York, no longer the Noo Yawk of my youth, with its mournfully tender streets of kind-hearted Irish cops, Italian small-time hoods, black hipsters and Jewish merchants. Manhattan was George Gershwin’s ‘Rhapsody in Blue’, the heartache, fear, ambition and joy of the city pulsating in its rhythmic and soaring score. Not any more.

New York Cement barriers, stanchions, cop cars, motorcycles, black SUVs, flashing lights, bullhorn warnings to move to the side or else, mean-looking dudes in dark suits, dark glasses and talking into their cufflinks, a hobbit named Sarkozy jogging in Central Park to the exclusion of the rest of us, African dictator kleptocrats emptying jewellery shops on Fifth Avenue, Netanyahu walking down Park after the residents of that street had been removed — that was the Big Bagel last week when the zoo that’s the UN Security Council came to town. The hate fest rolls on, fuelled by the arrogance of our supposed leaders and the reluctance by the hacks to call a spade a spade.

New York Irving Kristol, who died last week, was generally seen as the father of neoconservatism, a non-existent concept in Europe where we’re steeped in more traditional and less opportunistic politics. I once sat with him at a dinner in honour of William Buckley given by Drue Heinz in her east side townhouse. We were four: Kristol and his wife, Teresa Manners, as she was back then, and yours truly. Kristol was pleasant and fun to talk to. He was particularly intrigued by the fact that Lady Teresa’s old man was a duke and that Belvoir Castle was pronounced Beaver. One thing I noticed was that the old boy did not know how to eat properly. I found that interesting. Perhaps Kristol wished to retain a certain proletarian connection with his Trotskyite past. Never mind.

There is a mordant Eskimo proverb that says a good butler is worth at least three wives. The only trouble being I’ve never heard of an Eskimo with a butler. Gianni Agnelli had two he couldn’t do without: Pasquale, until he reached 40, and then Bruno, until the ‘avvocato’s’ death. I inherited mine from the Agnelli household. His name is Andrew Rolleston, and he is an Aussie — along with the Kiwis, the Poles and the Germans, in my Pantheon of best people. On his first day of service I was having dinner with the mother of my children in Cadogan Square when the telephone rang. ‘No, Mr Smith,’ I heard Andrew say, ‘Mr Taki is dining and he will ring you back.’ ‘Who the hell is Smith?

Gstaad From my desk facing the garden I look out on a vista of wooded green hills with an unblemished blue background. Far beyond, the mountains are grey and white-capped on top. The sun is blazing, the cows are grazing, and I have to leave this paradise for karate and judo training in the Bagel. Plus I have a broken fourth finger on each hand, as if turning 73 wasn’t enough. But I’ve been mountain climbing, and I’m in good shape despite the boozing. The Ionian had purple hills and beautiful seas but this outstrips them all. There is nothing like mountain scenery when there’s an orgy of nature bursting all around. (Or any other kind of orgy, for that matter.

Gstaad My Davis Cup partner Nicky Kalogeropoulos won both the Wimbledon and Roland Garros junior titles in 1963, and the following year, at four–all, 30–all in the fifth set against the French champion Pierre Darmon, signalled his opponent’s ball good after the umpire had called it out giving Nicky a breakpoint. He lost the match but has been known ever since for his sportsmanship. As I write, the US Open is at full tilt, and Nicky rang from Costa Rica to wish me a happy birthday. I didn’t bother to tell him he was three weeks late. We talked instead about a new book with the unfortunate title, A Terrible Splendor.

Gstaad What I find quite fascinating is how Americans have a blind spot about their own flaws in the area of human rights, and how they feel they have a duty to lecture other countries on the issue. I am, of course, referring to the outrage over the Libyan deal, an outrage shared by most people who have not sold out to Big Oil. But successive United States governments have never had any qualms in maintaining close relationships with dictatorial regimes the world over, so suddenly why the screams? Didn’t the sainted Obama play footsie with Gaddafi in Rome some weeks ago at the G8 summit? And weren’t the first people to be flown safely out of the United States following 9/11 Bin Laden’s relatives? Who do they think they’re kidding?

Gstaad Gee whizz, couldn’t someone have told me about it 19 years ago? Did I have to read it in Toby Young’s column? Someone should be held responsible, but who? It was only two weeks ago that I discovered that there is a scale of recognition in British public life — ‘an unofficial honours system’ — and that Desert Island Discs is undoubtedly near the top. Hooray! Had I known, I would have done something about it. Such as snubbing slobs like the Abramovich, Sugar and Green lot, not to mention parvenus like the Blairs. When I was invited to become a castaway, the sweet and attractive Sue Lawley sat opposite me and guided me through the programme. She had pretty legs and I commented on them, and she could not have been friendlier.

On board S/Y Bushido, off Corfu In a state of pre-orgasmic tension and anticipation, I sail into Nat Rothschild waters off the north-east tip of the island. Just across the narrow channel lies Albania, the land that God forgot for close to 75 years. Greeks are known to dislike Albanians, but young Taki is an exception. Albanians are fair with blue eyes and are totally committed to stealing, as well they should be after 75 years of great poverty and Godless communism. As the crow flies, or better yet as the dolphin swims, two miles separate one of the world’s richest and best-connected families from Europe’s poorest schmucks. The Rothschild peninsula and compound is the green light of West Egg to Albanian Gatsbys pining from afar.

On board S/Y Bushido It has been three weeks of non-stop peregrinations in Greek waters, a mere bagatelle when compared with the ten-year quest of a certain tempest-tossed figure called Odysseus, which of course makes young Taki a rather dull sailor. No tasting of forbidden fruit, at least not too much, no growing drunk on love in the arms of the nymph Calypso — nor Keira or Mary, for that matter — no feelings of indescribable rapture upon hearing the sweet-tongued Sirens, just a long peaceful sail around the islands and sea that has always brought back pleasant memories from my childhood when I first read about the legend of Odysseus.

On board S/Y Bushido Here are some rules of the ocean: always establish the direction of the wind before undoing your flies at sea; never go to sea without more books than days you plan to be afloat; keep in mind that new romances on board last on average less than a week. For now, let’s stick to books, as I have four loos on board and also the mother of my children. The latest literary count is four down, two to go before I hand over Bushido to my son JT and his latest flame, the great-granddaughter of Ernest Hemingway. Love Child by Allegra Huston, Chaplin’s Girl by Miranda Seymour, D-Day by Antony Beevor and Death of the Wehrmacht — the German Campaigns of 1942, by Robert M. Citino.

On board S/Y Bushido While the eastern islands of Greece are being whipped daily by the meltemi, the hot, strong winds that can turn sailors into zombies, the western side, or the Ionian, remains soft, green and as feminine as ever. The sea off Cephalonia is smooth and mirror-like, but this year I have yet to make contact with mama and baby porpoise. Assos is the tiny village that clings to a small isthmus between the island and a huge forested pine hill crowned by a ruined 15th-century fort. One year ago the road up to the fort was a dirt one. EU moolah, provided mostly by British and German taxpayers, has turned it into a paved-stone path, living proof that those mega crooks in Brussels continue to find ways to spend your money on useless projects such as this.

‘One can name-drop with impunity when writing about the past,’ said Nicky Haslam. ‘What is hard is to avoid it when writing of the present,’ according to the sage. I remember when this column began 32 years ago readers writing in to complain about ND. But what was I to do? Go to a grand ball and not mention anyone but the help? Or the name of those in the band? There was still high life back then, and most people wished to know who was partying and where. Before the crumbling of the social order it was fun to read about toffs dancing the night away. Now we have ‘Sir’ Philip Green appearing daily in the gossip columns, which in a manner of speaking has done away with name-dropping. As Lady Bracknell would doubtlessly have exclaimed, ‘Philip Green!

So farewell, then, to probably the best Wimbledon fortnight ever, certainly the sunniest that I can remember. Andy Roddick now joins Gottfried von Cramm and Ken Rosewall as a three-times-losing finalist, coming within a whisker of winning the greatest trophy in tennis, but turning into a tragic hero instead. Still, unlike the elegant German baron and the great Aussie, Andy might still do it, although I wouldn’t bet on it. But not to worry, Andy old chap, you’ve got by far the prettiest wife of all the players, and you exhibited more fight and good sportsmanship than the rest of the field combined. Roddick should be made an honorary member of the All England Club for bringing some decency to the game.

Poor Michael Jackson. His last words were: ‘Take me to the children’s ward.’ But it was nice of the jockeys in Santa Anita to wear a black mourning band in honour of a man who rode more three-year-old winners than anyone. Mind you, I thought the great Paul Johnson was the best when I happened to tell him over the telephone of Jackson’s untimely death: ‘Was he a member of the Beatles?’ Er, well no, dear Paul, but he was in the same undignified business. It has been said that you only ever meet the world once, in childhood. All the rest is memory. Jackson, I suppose, wished to remain a child, although from what I’ve read, his childhood was ghastly. (I never saw him perform and found him so repellent I avoided looking at his picture.

Rolling though picture-perfect hills and fields of maize and barley towards Wembury House, Devon, for the annual Hanbury cricket match. At times it’s a scene from a Fifties film of a long-ago England, beautiful, tranquil and law-abiding, with glimpses of broad greens, riverside walks and winding country lanes. But then comes the announcement in an English I can hardly comprehend, however hard I try, apologising about a diversion because of hay on the tracks. ‘Hay on the tracks?’ I ask incredulously.

Does absence make the heart grow fonder? I’m not so sure. I’ve been away from London for one year, and was dreading the return. The grey sky, the Dickensian streets, the fat-bellied lager louts, the knife culture, Gordon Brown and Peter Mandelson, the coarsest of the coarse Alan Sugar in the House of Lords: a good place to miss, I told myself. Well, it didn’t last long, my dread of the return. Nicky Haslam in cabaret was a real treat, and Lord Charles Churchill’s idea to turn Nicky into a Cole Porter performer at Bellamy’s was an inspired one. John Standing singing Noël Coward was as brilliant as it gets, and Nicky Haslam crooning Cole Porter was first class.