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“... David Ben-Gurion​ , the founder of the state of Israel, was brooding, explosive, often on the verge of collapse: every obstacle he faced was a ‘catastrophe’. He dabbled in mysticism, consulted fortune-tellers, claimed to see flying saucers, and lived according to his whims. At one point he went on an unannounced holiday from his duties as prime minister to take driving lessons on the French Riviera; on another occasion, he spent a week studying Buddhism in Burma, and tried to persuade his teachers that he’d stumbled on a contradiction in their doctrine no one else had unearthed ...”

“... 4 January, Yorkshire. A heron fishes by the bridge as I walk down to get the papers this morning, but when I draw nearer it takes off and flaps up the beck. Not a rare bird, the heron’s size is never less than spectacular, and grey and white though they are they still seem exotic. Bitterly cold with snow forecast later so we get off early up the M6 to Penrith and Brampton, hoping to have a look at the Written Rock, a quarry by the river at Brampton with an inscription carved by the legion that cut the stone here for nearby Hadrian’s Wall ...”

“... on top of the Mount of Olives you walk down past Gethsemane to the city, taking the road used by Jesus: what other could he have used? This brings you near the Golden Gate, by which Messiah must enter: it is blocked off, and the Muslims have craftily established a graveyard in front of it, so that no priest can ...”

“... This is a valuable account, written by a first-hand reporter, of the Royal Shakespeare Company’s tour with Coriolanus, directed by Terry Hands, to Paris, Vienna, Amsterdam, Hamburg, Berlin, Munich and Zurich. The company were known to Europe from previous visits, but it was a bold adventure, the bolder for the play chosen ...”

“... When Frederic Church’s lost painting ‘The Icebergs’ was found to be in the possession of a school in England, newspapers here had to explain that Church was a 19th-century American painter. The picture made 2½ million dollars at auction in New York: a reminder that provincial values – in a number of senses of those words – can still surprise ...”

“... restaurant, I think on Goodge Street, with Dudley Moore and Jonathan Miller, the meeting arranged by John Bassett, whose idea it was that we should all work together writing the review that turned into Beyond the Fringe. Having already written while still an undergraduate a large slice of the two West End shows Pieces of Eight and One Over the Eight, Peter ...”

“... It wraps itself around you and casts no shadows.Some of the works on the studio walls are covered by large linen canvases that could be mistaken for paintings with their backs turned to you and their stretchers showing. Hodgkin gave up painting on canvas at the beginning of the 1970s because he felt that the material sagged ...”

“... fashion magazine, and although I never shop, am at best a threadbare ragamuffin and it wouldn’t be unfair to call me a slob, I knew we had one thing in common: we’d both dealt with fact-checkers. ‘Oh, they’re just so thorough,’ she said. ‘Yes, they really clean things up if you’ve been sloppy,’ I said. ‘And they call every place you’ve ...”

“... set of shadows. She is wearing an overcoat, walking the streets, looking troubled. This must be a film noir; the only real questions are where the corpse is, and what she has to do with it. None of these details is accidental or unimportant for the film we are watching, and the effect is memorable, but half of our inferences are wrong. This is Lana ...”

“... We’d​ all be human if we could,’ a sinister character sings in The Threepenny Opera. His hypocrisy is unmistakable, but the ironic implication may also be right. We don’t all want to be human, even if it’s possible. We have other ambitions ...”

“... wrote an essay, in the form of concrete poetry, for the accompanying catalogue, which was designed by IG member Edward Wright (who went on to create Scotland Yard’s revolving sign). It was this spiral bound scrapbook, with a cobalt blue cover and cheap offset lithography, that made Richard Hollis want to be a graphic ...”

“... on Marxists, who allegedly believe in historical determinism. Take this latest instalment, edited by Andrew Roberts, who has himself contributed an essay on the bright prospects that would have faced Russia in the 20th century had Lenin been shot on arriving at the Finland Station. One of Roberts’s arguments in favour of this kind of history is that ...”

“... particular challenge. He was exceedingly prolific and many of his best paintings are too large to be moved. He also employed a team of able assistants, whose contribution to individual pictures is generally hard if not impossible to assess. The Veronese show now at the National Gallery (until 15 June) is the largest devoted to him since one held in Venice in ...”

“... raised the swastika over the Acropolis, Homer Davis, president of Athens College, was entrusted by the Greek War Relief Association with changing two million dollars into drachmas – money raised by his fellow Greek-Americans. Warned that the money would be delivered in small ...”

“... side of Washington says in language that may seem a little advanced for the 1860s: ‘Well, I’ll be fucked.’ Lincoln says: ‘I wouldn’t bet against it.’ The posters for the movie, its length (two and a half hours) and the general air of piety that surrounds Lincoln’s name lead us to expect some sort of epic, Saving President Abe, or Close Encounters ...”