What irritates me is the bland way people go around saying 'Oh our attitude has changed. We don't dislike these people any more.' But by the strangest coincidence they haven't taken away the injustice the laws are still on the books.

It took the Metropolitan Museum of Art nearly 50 years to wake up to Pablo Picasso. It didn't own one of his paintings until 1946 when Gertrude Stein bequeathed that indomitable quasi-Cubistic picture of herself - a portrait of the writer as a sumo Buddha - to the Met principally because she disliked the Museum of Modern Art.

All those who offer an opinion on any doubtful point should first clear their minds of every sentiment of dislike friendship anger or pity.