“... writer, and length of life, might be expected to provide some co-ordinates. Yet even among modern masters there is little consistency. James died in his early seventies, Musil in his early sixties: Leon Edel and Karl Corino awarded them each two thousand pages. Kafka, who barely reached the age of forty, yielded only five hundred fewer from Reiner ...”

“... the 1960s, and as a protraction of the colonial past. France and Spain were Morocco’s colonial masters, each with tranches of its own in the territory. The foundations of colonial rule had been laid by European mercantile adventurers, but it wasn’t until the early 1900s that the pretext for state intervention arose, when foreign lenders lured Moulay ...”

“... have been good at English. You must have been a star at essays.Well, not quite a star. But the masters thought I was pretty good and so I came to see myself in this role. You know – take a look at my sensibility which is surely superior to yours. By all means clatter off to your games, you muddy fools. In truth, of course, I envied them because that was ...”