“... darkroom somewhere in the basement of the newspaper’s weird Neo-Gothic premises on Edinburgh’s North Bridge, to forge a series of possible images for editorial approval. They had to be just right. This was glamour-enhancement where subtlety was all, the opposite of crass photo-vérité. Old Ukania thought it could still teach the Commies a thing or ...”

“... to Mason, much of Britain’s early supply of sugar, priced ‘unimaginably high’, came from North Africa, and was used as spice, medicine or preservative. Medieval banquets of the kind at which the jester jumped into the custard bowl boasted pyramids of sweetmeats of one sort or another. This book omits to tell us of the sugar spectacular at Elvetham ...”

“... in Canada, a civil servant in the Gold Coast, a staff officer in London, a political observer in North Africa, a tourist in Italy and a liaison officer in the invasion of Southern France’. A little later, the Ambassador, Duff Cooper, declared that he was ‘extremely anxious to have him’, so Ayer became ‘a diplomat in Paris’, where he met everybody ...”

“... proportional representation and where there is not, the political reflexes on which the parties in north-western Europe have relied are breaking down. There would seem to be a change in the interests which these parties have presumed and been presumed to reflect. What these interests have been presumed to be is, in general, clear. On the right, they have been ...”

“... strife under Vichy and the Nazi occupation, have come from transatlantic scholars such as John C. Cairns, Philip Bankwitz, Telford Taylor and Robert O. Paxton. Eleanor M. Gates might modestly disclaim inclusion in such distinguished company. But she has produced a splendid book which is both instructive and moving. She is not much interested in the ...”

“... discharged. Perhaps this is why some of our writers, given the chance, become performing seals. John Malcolm Brinnin met Capote before his first novel was published and remained close to the novelist for many years,2 increasingly concerned about the extent to which his friend was cultivating his fame at the expense of his art. Brinnin had sponsored Dylan ...”

“... turned to the question of the ‘development’ of the hitherto poor societies. As he says, and as John Sheahan elaborates in his essay in the other volume, the new development economics had from the beginning been critical of existing economics. It resisted what was then, and has once again become, the orthodox insistence on caution, on the need to limit ...”

“... Stores dividend slips, the club cards, her spare hair nets, small gold safety pins, and a St John’s Ambulance First Aid book.’ Or maybe in the couple of old, badly-mended lustre jugs hanging above? ‘In each you would find something interesting: a small roll of bandage, a coin, a hair clip, a bus ticket or a stub of pencil with a rubber in its end ...”

“... English reviews. It is unlikely that this situation can change. Ireland, with a total population, north and south, of under four million people, is a land which offers international and native authors a tax-free haven but has not yet managed to provide its poets and novelists with a taxable income. Unlike other former British Dominions such as Canada and ...”

“... But then again, he thinks, perhaps he’s wrong, and anxiously calls the next chapter ‘North Korea?’ He also suffers from mood swings. We leave him ‘weeping, weeping, weeping endlessly’ before encountering him the next day, right as rain: ‘This morning at four thirty, it’s a pleasure to settle back in on my zafu.’Yoga, he feels, gives ...”

“... Romania, for example. The problems were forcefully pointed out by the troops on the ground when John Major went to visit them in Kuwait after the war. He said that Options for Change would not be implemented until the lessons of the war had been analysed. However, Tom King, then the Secretary of State for Defence, had already promised to give the outline to ...”

“... Back in the 1960s, when I was studying to become a Sufi saint in North Africa, my Sheikh told me to read the Koran again and again, stopping only for prayers, meals and sleep. At that stage in my life I had only the most elementary knowledge of the background to the Koran. Equally crucially, I had no knowledge of, or access to, the vast body of exegetical literature developed over the centuries to explain it ...”

“... could break out in other friendly states. Asked whether he expected similar unrest in Jordan, John Kerry, who was admirably forthright in calling for Mubarak to stand down, dismissed the idea: ‘King Abdullah of Jordan is extraordinarily intelligent, thoughtful, sensitive, in touch with his people. The monarchy there is very well respected, even ...”

“... eat my hat. Act One: Little Eunice Waymon, a piano prodigy according to her teacher in Tryon, North Carolina, destined to be the first internationally celebrated black classical pianist. She lived in a hard-working family; her mother was a Methodist minister, her father a handyman before becoming a preacher and then an invalid. Eunice’s talent was ...”

“... theme. His was the biggest Democratic victory since 1964. Yet in Florida, Indiana, Maryland, North Carolina, New Jersey, New Mexico, Nevada, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Virginia, all of which he won, Obama lost among white voters.* In each case he won these states because he won massive majorities of the black and Hispanic votes (95 per cent and 67 per cent ...”