“... Political Justice went off like a bomb in the heightened atmosphere of 1790s Britain, at war with revolutionary France and with a government intensely suspicious of radical activity at home. ‘No work in our time gave such a blow,’ Hazlitt recalled. ‘Tom Paine was considered for the time as a Tom Fool to him.’ The book was exorbitantly ...”

“... and ‘planning’ movements in Britain and Europe before, during and after the Second World War has suggested that those movements drew their direct inspiration at least as much from the ‘positivist’ legacy of Comte (and his mentor Saint-Simon) as from the more obvious influences of either democratic socialism or Soviet-style Marxism. Some of the ...”

“... of analogies – from Yuri Gagarin’s spaceflight to a Chris Marker documentary about the Pacific War and Dickens’s A Christmas Carol – to help her navigate the territory. Some are more successful than others, but they all expose the doubleness of Chilean society in a period when life could be either peaceful or extremely dangerous, depending on who you ...”

“... Harm, an advocacy group launched in 2016, which supports families and aims to end ‘the failed war on drugs’. She says that not everyone using drugs fits the stereotypes. ‘These kids played softball and soccer and joined the boy scouts.’ Her son started using drugs as a teenager, first OxyContin – the prescription opioid made by Purdue Pharma which ...”

“... flags featuring the watchword ‘Jai Shri Ram’ (hail Ram), which doubles as a greeting and a war cry for the Hindu right, appeared across New Delhi. Models of the temple went on display at shopping malls; ornate banners of Modi and Ram hung from footbridges. It was hard to believe that such a transformation had been wrought by the inauguration of a ...”

“... brilliant essays on television and tennis. When French TV started revisiting the Second World War, Daney suggested that Pétain had become a name for what was still being hidden or denied – a saint, a puppet, ‘only a signifier’. In an endless match against Jimmy Connors, John McEnroe was the bearer of a fable: ‘The winner won’t be the one who ...”

“... largely a mirage, and its sentimental pursuit of them alienates its actual supporters. Familial class ties that once bound voters to parties have weakened. Recent research shows that those attracted to challenger parties – both the Greens and Reform – are more likely to say that their preferred party reflects their values and desired policies. In ...”

“... wrote nearly all the group’s best tunes, only to be pushed out for being a Beatles-loving middle-class namby.) Andrew Loog Oldham, who managed the Rolling Stones, was the crucial precursor in grasping that bad publicity was useful – something to be actively sought, even fabricated. But he hadn’t featured so prominently in the coverage of his clients as ...”

“... an indication of how the party’s changing, Wilfred got selected for Chippenham – white, middle-class, you know, deepest Wiltshire. And Wilfred tooled up to the selection meeting, wearing his jeans and an open-necked shirt, and just took them by storm. And they love him.’ ‘Do you want to meet Wilfred?’ the press officer said. ‘Yeah, you should ...”

“... or places of higher education. And here is Bruce’s open scholarship to Exeter in 1922, his first-class degree three years later; his Senior Demyship at Magdalen in 1925 and the Bryce Studentship; then, in 1926, a fellowship at Magdalen. Unsurprisingly, he doesn’t figure in any of the team photographs that line the corridors.A woman is restoring some of the ...”

“... prominence, not only because it provided a simple picture of the dangers of a post-Cold War world, but because he wrote of ethnic hatred and religious intolerance without the usual liberal discomfort, indeed without appearing to make value-judgments of any sort. This new book is an elaboration of that article and a response to its critics. Dazzling ...”

“... reports, ‘James began to form friendships of a more significant kind – with members of his own class, the writers and artists of London.’ There was something in the air of the early 1880s and he began to allow it to enter his mind, an air ‘full of events, of changes, of movement (some people would say of revolution, but I don’t think that)’.When ...”

“... the ghost of the deceased Roman Empire sitting crowned on its own grave.’ In this splendid pre-war novel we meet Thomas Quayne, a successful businessman, and his smart wife Anna, both in their thirties: very comfortable, three servants, one char, no children, living in a moderately elegant house, though not a Nash house, on the Outer Circle of Regent’s ...”

“... Coal was delivered by horse and cart, as was milk, and when I was evacuated during the war – though I find this hard to believe now – I went to Ripon market by horse and cart. On the other hand, I have never been to a horse-race. Stubbs was born and brought up in Liverpool, then moved to York, and then beyond York to an area even more remote ...”

“... China in the ten years between its conquest of power and 1958, and had left the chaos of the civil war and late Republican China behind. The first two five-year plans had achieved high levels of growth in industry and agriculture and the Chinese had fought the United States to a standstill in Korea. For the elite, then, the success of the Revolution, of ...”