“... on the grounds that they reward the effort handsomely. But the same is true of manuscripts.Cotton may not have known what he had. His librarian, Richard James, labelled the manuscript: ‘Vetus poema Anglicanum in quo sub insomnii figmento multa ad religionem et mores spectantia explicantur’ (a poem in old English ...”

“... his scientists’. Harrington’s sensible suggestion that legislators should assume that citizens may be wicked is taken as an assertion of original sin. But Dr Davis has illuminating things to say about Harrington’s ‘basically federal’ system of government, in which the municipal boroughs were ‘absorbed into the county’, and about his deference to ...”

“... many older folk in the village, apart from Nan Shepherd. She had taught my mother, whose name was May Salmond, between 1950 and 1953 at Aberdeen Training Centre, where students were ‘trained’ to be teachers. The general method of instruction conformed to the norms of the 1950s classroom: students were addressed like children, desks were laid out in rows ...”

“... Shaw had observed only a harmless drudge, Mr Laurence sees ‘an exacting science’, a work that may be ‘treated artfully’, and the culmination (like an elevation to the peerage) of a lifetime’s achievement. It was nevertheless Shaw’s blindness to the beauties of bibliography that opened the way for Mr Laurence’s magnum opus. Shaw’s dislike of ...”

“... himself of this opinion as he returned to the company of Bronson Alcott and Jones Very. One may well feel that the defensive condescensions of provincialism could hardly go further. Clearly, Emerson was more at ease among the undemanding tranquillities of Concord than amid the provocative and turbulent stimulations of Europe. He lived on until ...”

“... how such a modern self as yourself was much less content to be nothing much. Sexual intercourse may have started in 1963, with the Beatles’ first LP and so on, but intercourse of many another sort was at the same time starting to stop. Drinking and dancing went on, but in a different way – the clubs stopped being places where young and old of a similar ...”

“... Capote have severely diminished even as the reputation of O’Connor has steadily risen. McCullers may be perceived in some quarters as a writer of young adult classics whose work has not transcended its era; Capote is little read except for his atypical In Cold Blood, which was the inspiration for more complex and ambitious non-fiction novels by Norman Mailer ...”

“... makes his favourite writers sound rather like a squad of marines, or weekend hikers. Writing about Richard Eberhart in 1960, for example, he claimed that ‘Eberhart ... is a prolific writer, so the metaphysical pieces may merely be poetic callisthenics to keep him fit until his next burst of creative energy.’ Of Hugh ...”

“... and Irn Bru, and the great new self-help ethos has had little trouble finding local imitators. It may be an indirect part of Princess Diana’s legacy to the British nation, the success of The Little Book of Calm, but self-help has had its main British impact on television. Trinny and Susannah have just come back with a new series of What Not to Wear, a show ...”

“... turned, from which some semblance of pre-modern Gemeinschaft might still just about be salvaged. Richard Steele, Oliver Goldsmith, Laurence Sterne, Francis Hutcheson and Edmund Burke all made vital Irish contributions to this nouvelle vague of meekness, tendresse, womanliness, the glowing, melting sentiments, while David Hume, Adam Smith, Henry Mackenzie and ...”

“... with difficulty, supported by one of his ‘pretty young assistants’. The meeting with Mao may have represented a momentous ‘earthquake in the Cold War landscape’ as MacMillan claims, but it was hardly the ‘serious and frank exchange of views on Sino-US relations and world affairs’ that would be claimed in the Shanghai Communiqué signed by ...”

“... upon this follows ‘the thought of high windows’. Strong and terse as it is, ‘High Windows’ may not be one of Larkin’s very best poems. As happens elsewhere in his work, a juxtaposition of social caricature with sudden withdrawn reflection can make for difficulty. A manner of casual colloquiality does not necessarily produce a movement of thought that ...”

“... reader, two warnings should be offered. The opening chapter, about Church and State, may seem the hardest: begin with Chapter Two. Secondly, do not expect tidy answers. Collinson’s thesis, although lucidly and vigorously presented, is honourably complex and tentative. This is the modern manner, history with its head ...”

“... but Paulin ranges widely in the 20 volumes of P.P. Howe’s complete edition, and his speculations may arm some readers for the harder climbs in Hazlitt’s work: brilliant metaphysical essays like ‘On Genius and Common Sense’ and ‘On Depth and Superficiality’’ and the demolition of the theory of self-interest and identity in the Principles of Human ...”

“... perjury in 1999 he has written books about himself and other public figures who fell from grace: Richard Nixon, his former special counsel Charles Colson, and John Newton, the Anglican hymn-writer who once captained slave ships. Nazarbayev’s life story doesn’t have this trajectory. It is 19 years since he became his republic’s leader and his rise has ...”