“... included playwrights (Michael Frayn), pop stars (Sandie Shaw), TV presenters (Janet Street-Porter) and typographers (Ruari McLean developed a small modernist house on a gap site next to his Georgian pile in Blackheath Park). A Czech wine merchant paid for his house wholly in wine. The future prime minister James Callaghan commissioned a modernist house ...”

“... to call off the show.’ One night he nearly met Yves Saint Laurent, Rudolf Nureyev, Andy Warhol, Catherine Deneuve and someone called Betty Catroux. In fact, on the dancefloor, Nureyev took his hand and twirled him round and round for what, he tells us (and it must be so), ‘seemed like an eternity’. Then Rupert went to drama school, where they found that ...”

“... of the Duke of Norfolk, grandfather of Henry VIII’s most unfortunate wives, Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard, to whom he may have passed on impeccable nasal hygiene. The text does not, alas, teach how to avoid being beheaded by a king.It wasn’t until 1744 that John Newbery published what is generally thought to be the first children’s book: A Little ...”

“... dad’s a doctor; he’s a nurse. A gardener.’ Yasin’s father, Abdulaziz, 52, was actually a porter at University College Hospital. His mother, Faouzia, was involved in the sewing group at the Westway Trust. ‘She sat by the window,’ a colleague said, ‘dropping a stitch when she saw something funny outside.’ R.D.’s family were from Casablanca ...”