“... philosophy, and above all, into historiography, most notably perhaps in J.H. Hexter’s attack on Christopher Hill for lumping together a biased selection of the evidence to fortify his thesis about the rise of capitalism and the English Civil War. The temperature always rises when the splitters take action against the lumpers (it’s seldom the other way ...”

“... colonies would lead to a dire situation in which ‘the black man will have the whip hand over the white man’; ten years later, the prime minister-in-waiting Margaret Thatcher claimed in a television interview that British people were ‘really rather afraid that this country might be rather swamped by people with a different culture’. A moral panic about ...”

“... and shore up its authority in its own sphere of influence, while at home they would allow the White House to outflank the antiwar left. As Kissinger put it, ‘refusing to negotiate with the Kremlin would spread the virulence of the anti-Vietnam protest movement into every aspect of American foreign policy, and deeply, perhaps, into our ...”

“... us. One of them is John Felstiner, whose book about Neruda was reviewed in LRB a few weeks back by Christopher Reid.1 Felstiner some years ago wrote an essay that I for my part found arresting and persuasive, in which he argued – largely on the evidence of directions taken by several serious poets (Robert Lowell and Robert Bly, Elizabeth Bishop and Ed Dorn ...”

“... pathbreaking study that everyone interested in Fascism, or in Italy past and present, should read, Christopher Duggan fills the gap by examining a wide range of diaries, including Petacci’s, and the numerous letters sent to Mussolini by private citizens during the two decades of his rule, which often express the same intimate feelings towards the Duce and ...”

“... accept legally binding fossil fuel emissions targets. Then came Trump. Even before he entered the White House, Trump fired repeated rhetorical broadsides at Merkel, accusing her of ‘destroying’ her country by admitting too many refugees, complaining that she spent too little on defence and that the popularity of German cars in the US was down to dumping ...”

“... along with so many others in the September battle of the Somme – is written as clearly by the white sun on her face as if it had been worked there by a knife in marble. It is winter, and a protective wall behind Pamela hosts espaliered trees, apricot and peach. No shadows are visible, anywhere: the dark runnels of shade cast by the fake dovecote at the ...”

“... of this art being Guy Liddell. The development of this intelligence community is the theme of Christopher Andrew’s book, which contains the first reliable narrative history of the secret services from Victorian days to the present. Needless to say, he has received no encouragement from Whitehall, and former members of MI5 have been warned not to talk to ...”

“... peremptory: ‘Eve he supposed had as much sense as I had and she wore no clothes at all!!!’ A white silk dress was duly ordered (Mr C. graciously agreed to pay) and arrived properly ‘high and longsleeved’ and then, ‘on the very day of the ball, was sent back to be cut down to the due pitch of indecency’. Jane’s country-mouse observations on the ...”

“... at Holkham, was done according to the traditions of the landed aristocracy. The bride wore a white Norman Hartnell gown; the long gallery was filled with presents, ‘including a silver inkwell from the queen’. Tenants from both family estates feasted in three marquees in the park, each with its own wedding cake. Princess Margaret, still single, was ...”

“... completely professional during the past three decades, tennis deserves a place of honour in what Christopher Lasch called the culture of narcissism. A sport of skilful, well-mannered ladies and gentlemen has metamorphosed into a brutal confrontation between unpleasant, physically overdeveloped and remorselessly single-minded hitters, which is controlled by ...”

“... were to be grim and many. Now, in our happily inglorious days, we have them again, in Landeg White’s new English version of Os Lusíadas. This is admirably done, being neither rumbustious nor boastful but shrewdly suited to the spirit of a modern readership. Above all, perhaps, it comes most appropriately for the winding up of Portugal’s empire, five ...”

“... gateLovely aerial beetles of wonderful scintillateStrangest interest, and puffs of soft purest white –Soaking light, dispersing colouring for fancy’s delight.Of Maconachie, Paxton, Tickler, and Gloucester’s Stephens;Fray Bentos, Spiller and Baker, odds and evensOf trench foodKate Kennedy thinks he was equally talented in words and music: ‘The only ...”

“... commissions by the time he was 21. In his admirable introduction to the exhibition catalogue, Christopher Brown writes that ‘it is impossible to over-emphasise the impact of Rubens’s new style on the young Van Dyck’ – the style, that is, of the pictures Rubens painted after his return from Italy in 1608. The demand for Rubens’s work went far ...”

“... of the likes of Pat Buchanan notwithstanding – close to the political culture of its white, Puritan and overwhelmingly English origins. The Spanish settlements were never colonies, or, as the English called them, ‘plantations’ (before the attempted reforms of the late 18th century), but dependent kingdoms, or reinos de Indias, governed by a ...”