"What Has Hamlet Done for You Lately?"

In the Shakespeare country, where John Profumo was four times elected to Parliament before he was cut off in the blossoms of his sin, the air last week was promise-crammed. Campaigning for Profumo's seat were: left-wing Labor Candidate Andrew Faulds, 40, a bearded Shakespearean actor who actually discovered a slum in the Warwickshire countryside; Publisher Derick Mirfin, 33, a bright, toothy Liberal, who declared that "it's time to give the Tories a kick in the pants"; and Tory Angus Maude, 50, an able journalist and former M.P. who rebelled against the government's handling of Suez but was running on the Tories' record of service to the country.

Also on display: Farmer Miles Blair, 53, who spends most of his time writing letters urging closer ties with Portugal and South Africa and none at all with the U.S.; and David ("Screaming Lord") Sutch, a 22-year-old plumber's helper turned rock-'n'-roll singer, who called for a better deal for Britain's teenagers, though by law they are not permitted to vote for him, and affrighted Stratford-upon-Avon by campaigning in top hat and tails. "What," he asked disdainfully, "has Hamlet done for you lately?"

A staunch Tory stronghold, Stratford returned Profumo in 1959 with a massive, 14,129-vote margin over a Labor opponent. Though Maude last week was the odds-on favorite, fellow Tories feared that the presence of a vigorous Liberal candidate and two extremists in the race might seriously cut into Conservative strength. Maude was helped by a gentleman's agreement among all the candidates to avoid dragging Profumo into the campaign. In any event, the great majority of voters seemed unperturbed by disclosures of vice in high places.

Indeed, says Stratford Herald Editor Harry Pigott-Smith, the voters had long known that Profumo was "a naughty boy," and would gladly have kept the ex-War Minister as their M.P. if only he had not lied about his affair with Christine Keeler to the House of Commons. Stratford's most serious criticism of the government was that it had launched an irritating political diversion in the Shakespeare industry's peak season. On the other hand, most voters were probably too busy changing dollars and Deutsche marks to change parties.

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