“... with a handful of miscellaneous spectators, often including a Jesuit priest, a retired military gentleman and his wife, and the wily Surrealist André Breton. Some of them took Kojève out for dinner afterwards, so he must have been well liked. But he wanted to reach a larger public, and early in 1939 he published a sample in the prestigious literary review ...”

“... families. This budget helps hardworking people keep more of the money they have earned. His boss, David Cameron, criticising Labour in Parliament last month: They met with a bunch of migrants in Calais, they said they could all come to Britain. The only people they never stand up for are the British people and hardworking taxpayers. The former Conservative ...”

“... that surrounds discussions of sexual conduct, whether risky and deviant or not. When I spoke to David Attenborough he was amazed to hear that someone he knew might have been named by others as part of the scene surrounding Gamlin at All Souls Place. I don’t hesitate to believe him: he clearly knew nothing about it. Others saw much more than he did and can ...”

“... strike hair. A queer Pan with italicised attitude, Rimbaud gets the Leonardo DiCaprio film and David Wojnarowicz mask. All Baudelaire’s best-known head shots are from his twilight years: grouchy, standoffish, a dissipated cleric. Ghosting everyone, ghosting poetry itself, Rimbaud stops writing aged nineteen and disappears like a magician’s ...”

“... notion of privacy to Oxford’s material environment. Oxford’s self-perception began to shift. David Fairer’s absorbing chapter on ‘Oxford and the Literary World’ explains how the romance of Oxford began in the later 18th century. We perceive the beginning of an attitude that defines a university and especially Oxford as a kind of secret epicurean ...”

“... development conjured from the Bryant & May match factory, the weaver’s garret occupied by David Rodinsky above a decommissioned synagogue in Princelet Street, and the first speculative (and doomed) ‘Montmartre meets Montserrat’ restaurant on Dalston Lane. Wright managed to get an entire book out of a few hundred yards of old degraded Hackney ...”

“... the same from one abbey to the next.2 April, Yorkshire. Come across a thirty-year-old note from David Vaisey, at that time a postgraduate student at Bodley and subsequently its Librarian. The note just has a crudely drawn swastika and the slogan ‘A.L. Raus’.14 April. Pass two slightly cheeky-looking middle-aged businessmen in Hanover Square, one of whom ...”

“... raspberries, strawberries, lettuce, onions, peas, beans, radishes. ‘Very optimistically a gentleman is trying to grow kiwis,’ she said. ‘The cherries aren’t quite ripe enough to give you one … there’s an aubergine there but I don’t think it’s going to make it.’Only three of the ten flats still belong to the council. The rest have been ...”

“... Guardian. He said it would come from journalists he’d worked with there. He was obsessed with David Leigh and Nick Davies, two of the main reporters. ‘Davies is extremely hostile to me,’ Assange said. ‘The Guardian basically double-crossed the organisation in the worst way.’ (The Guardian denies this.) ‘We left them with a cache of cables – to ...”

“... young Austrian (25 years), smart appearance, of excellent Jewish family, seeks post as Chauffeur, Gentleman Servant, &c.: well informed in automechanics – Franz Leeb, Vienna XIV, Pillergasse 5.’4 July 1938: ‘Very efficient Viennese Cook (non-Aryan) of good family seeks position as Housekeeper; 17-year-old daughter seeks position as Nursemaid; both ...”

“... remembered Mrs Gold. ‘He was so handsome. And charming.’‘Absolutely charming. A perfect gentleman.’‘He did have something about him,’ cooed Mrs Gold.The three old ladies lost themselves in a rhapsody to the charms of my father.‘Where did your mother find him?’ wondered Mrs Gold jarringly, a little rasp in her voice.‘He could talk anybody ...”

“... waving cushions and towels, and some were leaning out. It happened that one of the firefighters, David Badillo, knew two of the uncles, Carlos and Manfred Ruiz, from the sports centre – they had all worked there as lifeguards – and Melanie gave Badillo her keys to their flat, 176 on the 20th floor. (They still hadn’t heard from Jessica.) Badillo went ...”