“... she snatches a few moments rest, upstairs, all hell will be let loose, downstairs. A rosary of brown glass beads, a cardboard-backed colour print of the Virgin bought from a Portuguese shop, a flyblown photograph of her solemn mother in Donegal – these lie or are propped on the mantlepiece that, however sharp the Massachusetts winter, has never seen a ...”

“... also what is billed in the programme as a ‘Special Guest’. This turns out to be Gordon Brown, who makes a decent speech too and one which, as R. says, must be impromptu as he repeats himself. Flattered to be gathered up by Neil and taken in past the explanatory displays (‘You don’t want all this foreplay, do you?’) to the figures ...”

“... bridge into the river Ingul. Grapevines shaded the walled yards of cottages painted pink and brown and blue.I wouldn’t have seen the signs that the Russians had been through the village – and come under Ukrainian fire – if Tatiana, an official from the Peresadivka hromada, hadn’t given me a tour. The old pontoon bridge blown up. The shot-up door ...”

“... falling three storeys down to the porch of the Athénée Palace (it had previously put out a Union Jack), and its English Bar had been symbolically occupied by the Germans – journalists, businessmen and members of the huge embassy retinue, most of whom were spies or Gestapo.Why not leave, when they had British passports and a homeland in reserve? Why ...”

“... with editorials, articles, broadcasts, appeals explaining to the French that they faced the brown peril and must now rally as one to Chirac, if the Republic was to be saved. Youth demonstrated in the streets, the official left rushed to the side of the president, even much of the far left decided it was the moment of no pasarán, and they too must ...”

“... the wars great-aunt Tess used to run the village telephone switchboard where each phone had a jack-plug of its own and the operator listened in and personally relayed every call (there is a splendid and hilarious example in the Ealing comedy Whisky Galore). Every Saturday morning great-grandfather used to open the back-parlour as a barber’s shop. He ...”

“... Sean Crampton had lost a leg (his prosthetic replacement, which was always attached to the same brown brogue, was placed behind a curtain at night, with only the foot showing, to deter intruders); Roger Lloyd had lost an arm (I initially thought that his huge dog, Gozo, so fierce that he had to be housed in a derelict tennis court, had torn it from its ...”