One of the key moments in that for the expat who reads is when he or she stands in front of the home base bookcase trying to decide which books stay and which ones come with you.

Preparing for Germany I looked at a wall of books knowing I could take only a couple of shelves. Not many authors escaped unedited, but two who did were John Mortimer and George Orwell.

Mortimer makes the cut because re-reading Rumpole is one of the best ways into a good night's sleep and Orwell because, well, if you want a perfect summary of Orwell's strengths you can't go past Clive James' latest collection of essays, Even As We Speak.

Clive James set out on his expat odyssey by ship from Sydney four decades ago. I can't give precise details because the three or four James books I own are now in a packing case somewhere south of the Tropic of Capricorn, to my regret.

From an Australian schooling and, from memory incomplete university career, he went to England to study and launch an increasingly glittering career in writing and television.

Over those years he has honed a style that sounds distinctly Australian, decidedly international and uniquely James.

His essay on George Orwell praises that author for the clarity of his thought and the uncluttered ease of his style, and in writing about him James displays similar virtues.

James is a wonderful writer because he has something to say and he says it clearly and spices the substance of his argument with wit.

In these essays James is at his best in dealing with substantial topics like Orwell, or in his review of Daniel Goldhagen's book Hitler's Willing Executioners.

Goldhagen caused a medium-sized storm in Germany a few years back with this book which argued that Germans, far from being forced into anti-Semitism by a handful of Nazi zealots, were in fact deeply anti-Semitic by nature and history and leapt at the genocidal opportunity offered them by Hitler.

James successfully argues against that reading of German 'nature' while accepting other arguments put by Goldhagen. It is a model of clear and insightful thinking on a topic which usually generates more heat than light.

For all his brilliance James does reveal some human failings in his essays.

The late Princess Di brings out the worst in him. He is transfixed from the moment of meeting her, his critical faculties are numbed and from then on he starts thinking with something other than his brain

In fact royalty generally seems to have a similar effect on him. In one essay, Plain- Clothes Police State, he sees the media treatment of royals and celebrities generally as like persecution of minorities by totalitarian regimes. First they make them sub-human, then they can be persecuted.

This is not Clive James at his most compelling.

Another, and related, blind spot is Australian republicanism. In arguing with Daniel Goldhagen, James does justice to the author's case, which makes his criticisms of it worthwhile.

But in dealing with Australian republicans, James, the royalist, drops his standards, misrepresenting his opponents and creating straw men to knock over. He settles for attacking the advocates of republicanism as self-promoting would-be presidents, rather than tackling the central issue, which is the silliness of one country having a head of state from another country.

Australian republicans can draw comfort from this, because you can be pretty sure if James can't put a good case for the monarchy, no-one can.

It is nice to think you could win some arguments with James, but most of the time you are in agreement and happy to go along for the smooth ride his writing provide whether the subject is the late Peter Cook or Hamlet.

On the latter he writes: "....I identify with Hamlet. In my mind's eye, he even looks a bit like me, perhaps a couple of stone lighter, with blond hair and more of it: one of those rare Aussies who happen to fence quite well and stand first in line of succession to the throne of Denmark."

Throughout these essays the author returns to the issues of a writer's style and voice, and he tackles those tricky issues in a style and voice that is all his own.

Next time I face the pre-departure bookshelf cull I think I'll be taking a few more volumes of Clive James with me.

Even As We Speak, New Essays 1993-2001 by Clive James, Picadors

Subject: Book reviews