“... a massive account of codes and cyphers that dominates the field, the American historian David Kahn devotes only a few pages to SOE, most of which are taken up with its notorious mistake. He talks of its ‘stupidity and incompetence’ and, with a hint of schadenfreude, describes the Dutch affair as ‘the worst Allied defeat in the espionage ...”

“... us off with the diplomatic and historical background of Pushkin’s life. Feinstein also mentions David Magarshack’s biography respectfully for what was at the time – 1967 – its up-to-date research but reprovingly for its lack of notes and references. (In fact notes do often appear in Magarshack’s book, as parentheses in the text, and there is an ...”

“... producing what it’s best at producing, and exporting that abroad. The writings of Adam Smith and David Ricardo are so influential in the trade world that most experts refuse even to discuss the merits of this basic laissez-faire assumption. The US, born out of a tax revolt in the same year that The Wealth of Nations was published, has long accepted it, and ...”

“... 19th century.’ This is true, and who will regret it, except maybe a few dedicated followers of F.R. Leavis, here the subject of a judicious piece by Stefan Collini, who understandably wonders why he should believe that ‘the possibility of living a truly human existence depends on the quality of reviewing in the literary weeklies’. But he is only saying ...”

“... By a considerable coincidence there are now published within a short interval the first biographies of two substantial Victorian literary figures, over a hundred years after the death of either man. The coincidence is made more striking by the similarities between George Henry Lewes and John Forster. They were two of the stars of Victorian literary journalism: much in demand as editors, and absolutely reliable in their capacity to produce essays and reviews of first-rate quality on a huge range of topics at an intimidating speed ...”

“... participate in it. Still, he has signalled a wish to defect from Offa’s camp, and a reading of David Norbrook’s recent, excellent study of political poetry, Poetry and Politics in the English Renaissance, should make him aware of the necessity for that ...”

“... of Scotland. I feel like a film reviewer who has started the week with an Ealing comedy or one of David Lean’s novel-adaptations (cutting out all the messy, sissy bits) and then has to plough through a set of desperate cast-of-thousands horror-movies. No doubt, Don Bloch and Denis Johnson are properly concerned about leprosy in Africa and the dangers of ...”

“... they include Jeremy Tradescant, who brings us up to date on his sister – but Charles’s lover, David Matheson, is a sad, complex figure, movingly portrayed. A passage of intimate feeling can follow a scene of black farce. It’s hard to say how these extremes are harmonised. Perhaps the historical perspective provided by Fish’s diaries permits of certain ...”

“... how from these laconic texts, figures like Rebekah, Jacob, Joseph, Judah, Tamar, Moses, Saul, David and Ruth emerge, characters who, beyond any archetypal role they may play as bearers of a divine mandate, have been etched as indelibly vivid individuals in the imagination of a hundred generations’. This aim, he warns us, cannot be achieved without ...”

“... Irish. Hartnett confesses himself to be ‘obsessed by the work and mind of Daibhi O Bruadair’ (David Broderick or Brouder), the 17th-century poet from the Limerick area who witnessed the tragic sequence of events which destroyed his native cultural habitat: ‘the Popish Plot, the coming of Cromwell, the battle of the Boyne, the Treaty of Limerick and its ...”

“... optimism of some of the earlier reformers. A recent impressive book by Keith Wrightson and David Levine, Poverty and Piety in an English Village,* suggested that Calvinist theology became especially acceptable to parish élites, the minority who were prospering in the great economic divide of the late 16th and early 17th centuries, as against the mass ...”

“... distinct from their contemporaries, in their liking for this form. Adam Bede uses it as much as David Copperfield: that is, more than five times as often as Jane Eyre. Here is a surprising pattern of convergence and divergence in the Victorian novel which could not be registered in the kind of account offered by MacCabe (for whom the Dagley-Mr Brooke ...”

“... gifted him with plenty money when he came out. In many ways it was a balanced life. Jokes like ‘David son of Joshua Son of Isaac son of Abraham O’Neil is in town and kiking everybody with big promises’ (to Ezra in 24) don’t have anything to do with it. I wrote terrific letters to bigots like Cardinal Spellman and Joe McCarthy and only regret I ...”

“... verse translations, a long biography of Haig, a short and oddly memorable study of the King David of the Bible, and one novel, Operation Heartbreak, about a clandestine war operation in which a body, purporting to be that of a British officer carrying secret documents, was dumped off the coast of Spain to deceive the Germans. As a singleton novel it is ...”

“... spontaneity, I hope, can be detected. The influential dialogues of our culture, from Plato’s to David Sylvester’s with Francis Bacon, have been the most conscientiously elaborated, while verbatim reporting essentially belongs to journalism. Robert Craft’s industry, dedication and literary skill not only make more palatable the two books under ...”