Sir: Well done to John Torode ('Women can run the world, too', 3 June) for pointing out that the Shirley Williamses and Lynda Chalkers of this world are ready, willing and able to take up hitherto male-held jobs such as the presidency of the European Commission. I do, however, disagree with his assertion that 'women would not bring a distinctive, feminine style to international affairs'.

Erik Homburger Erikson, psychoanalyst: born Frankfurt am Main, Germany 15 June 1902; Research Fellow, Harvard Medical School 1935-36; Research Assistant / Instructor / Assistant Professor in Psychoanalysis, Yale School of Medicine 1936-39; Research Associate in Child Development /Lecturer in Psychiatry /Professor of Psychology, University of California 1939- 51; staff, Austen Riggs Center 1951-60; Professor of Human Development / Lecturer in Psychiatry, Harvard University 1960-70 (Professor Emeritus); Distinguished Visiting Professor, Erikson Centre 1983-94; books include Childhood and Society 1950, Young Man Luther: a study in psychoanalysis and history 1958, Identity and the Life Cycle 1959, Gandhi's Truth: on the origins of militant non-violence 1969, A Way of Looking at Things: selected papers 1930- 80 1987; married Joan Serson (two sons, one daughter); died Harwich, Massachusetts 12 May 1994.

THE PLIGHT of the Greek scholar who has received death threats for describing the existence of a Slavic-speaking Macedonian community within Greece, has triggered an appeal to the Greek Prime Minister, Andreas Papandreou, by International Pen, the writers' group.

FROM Proust to Poe via The Three Musketeers and pornography, Six Walks in the Fictional Woods - a dashing and stylish series of six lectures - covers narrative time, authorship and reading. It displays Umberto Eco's enviable ability to transform arid semiotics and narrative theory into intellectual entertainment. This is no mean feat, but there are serious drawbacks to Eco's approach. Teresa De Lauretis calls him the John Ford of the semiological frontier. But he is also, like Chris the DJ from Northern Exposure, the patron saint of the ontologically twee.

Roger Wolcott Sperry, neurobiologist: born Hartford, Connecticut 20 August 1913; Researcher, Harvard University 1941-46; Assistant Professor of Anatomy, University of Chicago 1946-53; Hixon Professor of Psychobiology, California Institute of Technology 1954-84 (Emeritus); Wolf Prize in Medicine 1972; Nobel Prize for Medicine and Physiology 1981; National Medal of Science 1989; married 1949 Norma Deupree (one son, one daughter); died Pasadena, California 17 April 1994.

THE RIGHTS to exploit a mouse genetically pre-programmed in the laboratory to develop cancer have been bought by an American pharmaceuticals company.

If smokers need something to suck, a substitute cigarette containing nicotine but little else may be the answer.

Marija Birute Alseikaite, archaeologist and Indo-European scholar; born Vilnius 21 January 1921; Research Fellow, Peabody Museum, Harvard University 1955-63; Professor of European Archaeology, University of California at Los Angeles 1964-90; married 1942 Jurgis Gimbutas (three daughters; 1963 marriage dissolved); died Los Angeles 2 February 1994.

TALL MEN, said to have the edge over shorter men when it comes to getting a job or being selected for office, may have another advantage - a decreased risk of heart attack.

SCIENTISTS in the United States believe they can explain one of life's truisms - a cool brain works better than a hot one, writes Susan Watts.

WHEN Bobby Ray Inman went before the television cameras last Tuesday to explain why he was withdrawing as President Clinton's nominee for Secretary of Defense, acerbic New York Times columnist William Safire declared himself 'stunned'. So were many people here. But Safire had special cause.

WITH ITALY's premier statesman, Giulio Andreotti, on trial for Mafia association, it has become abundantly clear that the problem of Cosa Nostra is still more serious and far-reaching than even the bleakest pessimist had supposed.

WHEN Toni Morrison became the first black American to win the Nobel Prize for Literature, and only the eighth woman to win the award, it was inevitable that the Swedish Academy would be accused of overweening political correctness. Some US critics lamented that Henry James never won the award, nor Philip Roth, nor John Updike. Why Morrison?

WHAT Africanism became for, and how it functioned in, the literary imagination is of paramount interest because it may be possible to discover, through a close look at literary 'blackness', the nature - even the cause - of literary 'whiteness'. What is it for? What parts do the invention and development of whiteness play in the construction of what is loosely described as 'American'? If such an inquiry ever comes to maturity, it may provide access to a deeper reading of American literature - a reading not completely available now, not least, I suspect, because of the studied indifference of most literary criticism to these matters.