“... her Renault 5, or Philip Swallow and Morris Zapp of Changing Places crossing somewhere above the North Pole as their planes take them in opposite directions for the start of their academic job-swap. Two ideas setting off for each other’s point of origin: Paradise News lacks this beautifully simple dynamic, because everyone jumps on the same ...”

“... lighter in tonality, distinctly medieval in mood. Wycliffe reading his translation of the Bible to John of Gaunt, Chaucer and Gower present was started in 1847, a year before the foundation of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. Nevertheless it has the feel of a Pre-Raphaelite picture. Brown was never a member of the Brotherhood. But his steadfast professionalism ...”

“... 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 ...”

“... of the human settlement of that great hulk of fissured, pre-Cambrian rock that juts into the North Atlantic is one of harsh times getting steadily harsher. As I write, headlines in the Toronto Globe & Mail promise worse to come: ATLANTIC FISHERY DEALT NEW BLOW. SHUTDOWNS COULD LAST TILL END OF DECADE ‘The [groundfish] stocks are in the worst shape ...”

“... 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 ...”

“... 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 ...”

“... 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 ...”

“... the sort who thought Rangers fans should be sent to Australia on coffin ships, or made to work the North Sea oilrigs for no pay – and Uncle Peter for a while appointed himself the very man who would, as he delicately put it, ‘get all that poofy shite oot his heid before it really does him some damage’. Game on. But not for long. Uncle Peter arranged to ...”

“... and for the same reason: their attractions are calculated by eyes which are neither Roman nor North African. One tends to see what one knows and Gérôme knew what a pretty French girl looked like. He took great pains with the tiles, marble, robes, baths and so on, but suggesting that you know just what things look like physically (although I am not sure ...”

“... 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 ...”

“... of many men, including her husband, at the barracks on the Viale Giulio Cesare in Prati, a quarter north of the Vatican. Laura Lombardo Radice, a central figure of the communist resistance and the leading light of this and several other protests during the occupation, said she saw Gullace rush towards her husband, who was standing on the other side of the ...”

“... secretary of state for energy in the late 1970s, was that Britain should use its tax revenue from North Sea oil to build up a sovereign wealth fund. Norway did this, and has become one of the richest countries in the world; Benn’s idea was not adopted. The advocacy of greater democracy in these pieces often has a strong populist flavour, with frequent ...”

“... was born Guido di Pietro around 1395 in a hamlet in the Mugello, a region thirty kilometres north-east of Florence. By 1417 he was in Florence itself and already working as a dipintore, according to a document recording his admission to one of the city’s lay confraternities. Around 1420, he entered the Dominican Order, soon after taking the name ...”