CONTRIBUTORS TO THIS ISSUE

JACQUES ATTALI is a writer living in Paris

PAUL BARKER is the former editor of New Society and a senior fellow o f the Institute o f Community Studies

ANTHONY BARNETT is Policy Co-ordinator o f Charter 88

VERNON BOGDANOR is a fellow o f Brasenose College, Oxford. His book The Monarchy and the Constitution has just been published

MALCOM BRADBURY is a novelist and critic, and Emeritus Professor o f American Studies at the University o f East Anglia

LEON BRITTAN has been a vice-president of the European Commission since 1989

JAMES BUCHAN has been shortlisted for the Guardian Fiction Award for Heart’s Journey in IVinter

VINCENT CABLE is a senior research fellow at Chatham House

DAVID CANNADINE is Moore Collegiate Professor o f History at Columbia University, New York

JOHN CARR is a management consultant

JEREMY CLARKE is a mature student living in Glasgow. He is currently writing his autobiography

DANIEL DORLING is a British Academy fellow in Geography at the University o f Newcastle

CHARLES GOODHART is Norman Sosnow Professor o f Banking & Finance at the London School o f Economics

JOHN GRAY is a fellow o f Jesus College, Oxford. He has recently published a book on Isaiah Berlin

JAMES HARDING is learning Mandarin and will be opening an office for the Financial Times in Shanghai

DAVID HONIGMANN is the author o f the Incomes Data Services report Employment in South Africa.

DOUGLAS JOHNSON is Emeritus Professor o f French History at the University o f London. His essay is based on the Stenton lecture which he recently delivered at the University o f Reading

DAVID LASCELLES is Natural Resources editor at the Financial Times

HILARY RUBINSTEIN is one o f London’s leading literary agents

BERNARD SIMON is the Financial Times correspondent in Toronto

YAEL TAMIR is Professor o f Philosophy at the University o f Tel-Aviv

CHRISTOPHER TOOKEY is film critic for the Daily Mail

ARTYOM TROITSKY is editor-in-chief o f the Russian Playboy magazine and Russia’s best-known rock critic

MARY TUCK is a criminologist and former head o f research at the Home Office

Prosped:

OPENINGS 4 LETTERS 6 CURIOSITIES News snippets.

8 A EUROPEAN WRITES LEON BRITTAN argues that not to adopt a single currency in Europe could be even riskier than adopting one.

Brittan’s best solution. Page 9 10 RUN RABBIT RUN ARTYOM TROITSKY Russian Playboy has the highest proportion of female readers of all Playboy magazines worldwide. How did the editor get the women in?

12 A LONG DAY’S JOURNEY YAEL TAMIR Will Yitzhak Rabin’s assassination change the political map of the middle east?

14 IN THE NAME OF THE FAMILY MARY TUCK on the storm y progress of a Bill designed to protect women from domestic violence.

16 STRIKING LUCKY JIM HILARY RUBINSTEIN on “the tingle factor” when a literary agent reads a best-seller.

Issue three December 1995

Russian bunnies. Page 10

18 TRIBUTE TO GELLNER Do nations have navels? In his last public appearance in the UK, E rnest Gellner considered the question.

ESSAYS 22 L 'EXCEPTION FRANCHISE DOUGLAS JOHNSON reflects on the puzzle o f French grandeur from Revolution to Mururoa. Are they all Gaullists now? And if they are, what does this mean for Europe?

29 POVERTY OF ECONOMICS JAMES BUCHAN questions the inflated status of the economists. W hat can they tell us that Shakespeare can’t?

34 FROM HERE TO MODERNITY MALCOM BRADBURY gives a tour d ’horizon of the giants and pygmies of modernism, post-modernism and what comes after.

How many pints? Page 1S

2 PROSPECT December 1995