“... not least because few effective tests existed. In the 1950s, the rulebook for the Tour de France still stated that riders who wished to use drugs would have to supply their own. Things began to change, at least publicly, when several speed skaters nearly died after overdosing on amphetamines during the 1952 games in Helsinki. Fifa became the first ...”

“... missed their targets. The real importance of the air war was at the front, in Italy as well as France and Belgium. By mid-1918 the Allies’ air superiority was preventing German reconnaissance planes from finding out very much about their preparations for attack, while they themselves were gaining accurate information about enemy dispositions. There was ...”

“... presents rooms crowded with friends, colleagues, students of both sexes and family members; in France, the Dictionnaire de l’Académie continued to refer to the atelier as a collective space until 1835.Elsewhere in Europe, the age of revolutions was giving rise to a different aesthetic, which rejected the idea of the studio as emporium of wonders, or ...”

“... idealists. What do these ancient arguments have to do with the world of Ruling Performance, with David Pannick’s reflections on the English judiciary, or with Vernon Bogdanor’s Encyclopedia of Political Institutions? For one thing, they cast light on the hopes and fears most of us entertain in the face of government activity of all sorts. Realists who ...”

“... all others. It was founded in Oxford by Edward Lean, the younger brother of the film director David Lean, and was dedicated to the reading and discussion of creative work in progress. When Lean graduated, Lewis took it over. The group was for men only. (Dorothy L. Sayers, a keen Christian and an admirer of Lewis, was excluded.) At first, meetings were ...”

“... Belle du Seigneur in 1968; and is the object now of a growing scholarly and critical industry in France, with several books about him published in the last few years. The very first lines of Belle du Seigneur are these, and I’m not sure deference is possible here or would do us any good: ‘He dismounted and strode past hazel and briar, followed by the two ...”

“... An interesting section is devoted to the mass of anti-aristocratic pornography which appeared in France in the years preceding the Revolution. ‘If the philosophes had an influence on the events that brought about the revolution, so had the writers of bawdy and obscene chroniques scandaleuses,’ Wagner asserts. Certainly a work like Bordel national sous ...”

“... finance were inextricably linked. But as a result of the spiralling costs of the wars against France, and because of Parliament’s desire to keep a tight grip on the Army, the control of military finance was taken over by the House of Commons, and from 1697, the new king, William III, was paid an annual sum by Parliament, to cover his own royal ...”

“... rescued her from the unwelcome attentions of a soi-disant army captain, and eloped with her to France. On their return, Sheridan fought two duels on Eliza’s account; once married, the couple relied on Sheridan’s income as a theatre manager (he bought a controlling interest in the Drury Lane Theatre at the age of 25), and his earnings from the three ...”

“... in the writings of Voltaire and Rousseau. He turned 15 a few days after the Revolutionists in France renounced all seigneurial privileges; he would remain all his life the sort of springtime radical who does not let you forget the coincidence. That bliss was meant for him; he took its betrayal personally. A natural pedant with an acquired aptitude for ...”

“... as I write, talk of a second wave has receded. The first wave is enough to be getting on with. France, a centre-right government which once tried to pass for a centre-left one, tried to hold the line for longer than its equivalents in Italy or Spain. But once the line could no longer be held, it moved to an all-out war footing. For now the war is all there ...”

“... thought at one point it was near Pakistan. It’s actually kind of in the middle of Europe between France and Germany and somewhere else. OK, I’m still not 100 per cent sure. I went by plane for Christ’s sake’) but taught him a lot about how to fill dead airtime; then local commercial radio, before he made it to Capital Radio and the big time. Even at ...”

“... worse outcomes than other places. Mixed-payment, less centralised systems do better (Australia, France). We should probably do more of what they do. There’s the what. But how? Is it a question of electing politicians who say they’ll fix it? That seems unlikely: it hasn’t worked so far, and it’s hard for politicians to get elected while challenging ...”

“... energy supply now hinges on state-owned French companies based in Paris: Electricité de France, better known as EDF, and Areva, maker of nuclear power stations. Will EDF and Areva build a fleet of new nuclear reactors in Britain or won’t they, and if they do, how much will it cost the British and French public? Defending her record in Parliament ...”

“... fail to maintain her pretence of leadership. Neil Kinnock may, despite himself, take over. David Owen may come out of his increasingly conservative camouflage to capture that middle ground on which success in British politics has been said, with decreasing plausibility, to rest. None, however, has a politically able team behind them. Almost anything ...”