“Shamed by the Epstein scandal, riven by infighting: have the UK royals ever been in a bigger mess than this?” asks the headline on Stephen Bates’s article (6 February). Just a brief look back into history: the civil war between Stephen and Matilda, the Wars of the Roses, Charles I losing the throne and his head, Edward VIII’s abdication…
Dr Violet Moller
Marston St Lawrence, Northamptonshire
• I enjoyed Peter Bradshaw’s review of the excellent Ashes and Diamonds (3 February). He quotes the film where Krystyna asks Maciek why he’s wearing dark glasses. His answer about it being a souvenir of unrequited love for the homeland is a bitter joke. The eyes of resistance fighters who’d spent months underground, hiding from the Nazis, during the Warsaw Uprising (as memorialised in the equally excellent Kanal) were too sensitive to endure sunlight when they returned at last to the open air.
Michael Newton
Rotterdam, the Netherlands
• Re Deutsche Bahn’s family coaches (Letters, 2 February), in 1982, France’s SNCF introduced carriages with a children’s play area, including climbing frames, toys and other activities, and a nursery (espace enfants), on a number of long-distance services. There was even a promotional video.
Jeremy Nicholls
Audlem, Cheshire
• In 1964, my elder sister married a Norwegian and went to live in Norway. When my middle-aged parents went to visit, they were shocked at having to sleep under a “dyne”, pronounced “dee-na” (Letters, 5 February). They insisted on calling it a “downy”.
Ursula Hutchinson
Newport, Isle of Wight
• In Australia, a duvet is known as a “doona”. Not sure why.
Sarah Jenkinson
Doncaster
• Time now to have a blanket ban on duvet letters and put any future correspondence to bed, I think.
David Duell
Durham
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