Room 2D

Photo-story from Janus 116 Private Saffron James, 19, stands to attention with her bugle under her arm, nervously awaiting the arrival of a superior. When the door opens, the man is a stranger, drafted in from another regiment to conduct her disciplinary interview. Like the clothing, furniture and accommodation she has lived with for the past eight months, he smells of standard-issue army property: functional and unadorned. ‘Your cases are packed?’ ‘Yes, sir.’ ‘Why?’ ‘Because Sergeant Morris said I should be prepared for instant discharge, sir. He said I am not shaping up as a soldier and that if I only want to play pretty music, I should go to the Conservatoire, sir.’ Tears sting her eyes but she strives not to shed them. ‘So you want to be a musician?’ ‘Yes, sir. I joined the army to improve my playing and get real experience of life that I wouldn’t get at music college.’ ‘And has this been proven to be th...

A Richard Manton story from Janus 51 Where were you at 8.50am on 19 November 1985? If you were listening to Radio 4, you will have heard a spokesman for the Anti-Slavery Society talking of the new dangers which threaten the young and the beautiful. At first it sounded like a spoof, recalling all those old jokes about girls who accept sweets from strange gentlemen and end up ‘dancing on the tables in Port Said’. It is no spoof. Unemployment and recession in Western Europe have given a new glamour, for many girls, to the promise of well-paid and usually tax-free jobs as secretaries, dancers, club hostesses in parts of the world where the harem is a centuries-old part of culture. In an alarming revelation, quoted hereafter, the  Daily Telegraph estimated that a staggering 20% to 30% of all girls attracted by the bright lights and easy life of showbiz in such areas disappear into the sexual captivity of the harem. More asto...