The explosion of peaceful, mass revolt which has ended Soviet rule from Berlin to Bucharest - and will shortly end it also from Lvov to Vladivostok -… - Bernard Levin

But it is silly to brand liquor as the cause of alcoholic self-destruction, when far more deep-rooted psychological problems are responsible, with drink (and now, of course, drugs) being only the means.

As a child he had been brought up in the grim backstreets of 1930s Somers Town (between St Pancras and Euston stations) by his mother and her parents — Jewish refugees from Lithuania. His father had walked out on them when Bernard was three. That early betrayal, I always felt, explained a lot about why he stayed a bachelor. It was as if he used his intellect to dazzle because he found it difficult to communicate, or commit, on an emotional level.

As I say, I know nothing of wheeler-dealers and their wheels. I do, however, know a little about human beings, and a lot about the English language, and I needed no more than that to button my back-pocket in case Mr Cornfeld went by.