“... a whole, but the combination of conservative religion and nationalism is dominant across most of white, small-town, rural and often even suburban America. The county-by-county breakdown of the election results shows the Republicans winning even in upstate New York and throughout the interior of California, Oregon and Washington. With the exception of the big ...”

“... the cultural shortcomings of the planters he encountered and appalled by the living conditions of white labourers. He had been led to believe that housing would be on a par with that in New England: Nine times out of ten, at least … I slept in a room with others, in a bed which stank, supplied with but one sheet, if with any; I washed with utensils common ...”

“... Behind her the Italian countryside is bathed in a warm autumnal light that sets off the delicate white and cream of her softly ruffled dress and fashionable Leghorn hat. She too is fair, her pink and white complexion carefully shaded from the afternoon sun. Painted by Angelica Kauffman in Naples and Rome in 1785 and ...”

“... The only inaugural address with claims to have decisively shaped what followed came in 1841 when William Henry Harrison – ‘Old Tippecanoe’ – was so keen to show he was capable of observing the proprieties that he delivered a two-hour disquisition on constitutional government without a coat or hat in the cold and wet Washington winter. He caught a ...”

“... Wars. A tall bow-fronted house, it’s a bed and breakfast done out ‘boutique-style’, with white duvets, chocolate suede furnishings and modern ceramics. It was built on the site of a 16th-century cottage burned down in the Blitz and was recently renamed in keeping with the cobbled streets and battlements of the old garrison town. Across Portsmouth ...”

“... in the US and abroad; American Dreamers (2011), about the 20th-century left; and a biography of William Jennings Bryan, published in 2006, which attempted to rescue its protagonist from what E.P. Thompson in a different context called ‘the enormous condescension of posterity’. (Condescension regarding Bryan emanates from secular urban liberals who know ...”

“... Temple of Apollo’ after Claude Lorrain by William Woollett (1760) Among various unforgettable moments in a life much of which has been spent thinking about landscape in literature and the visual arts was a remark made ten years ago by Kirsty Wark in the programme which follows Newsnight on Fridays, in which she was chairing a discussion of the Gainsborough exhibition then at Tate Britain ...”

“... devices left around – the stage-directions, the Hollywood sets and props, or the drollery of white-furred crocodiles and cyanide shoes. But some of these devices are a bit nervous. ‘The Unconscious Imitated by a Cheesecake’ – chapter heading – was perhaps arrived at by chance, through aleatory techniques (not generally much in evidence in this ...”

“... a box containing the original illustrations from Every Short Story (2012). They tumbled out like a William Blake vision: boggle-eyed angler fish, flying horses, crying demons, brain babies, Amazonian women, scenes of bacchanalia: a smorgasbord of grotesquerie. In another box, I discovered an exquisite book called ‘Morag’s Museum’, which Gray made for ...”

“... to party.’ The truth, to use Amory’s phrase, is ‘more compact’. According to his chauffeur William Crack, Berners owned a small legless, clavichord made by Arnold Dolmetsch, which he took about with him in the tool compartment of his car, a place where nobody could possibly play on it. This portentous instrument has been a real blessing to both ...”

“... in British self-consciousness after the war. Soon after the test, the Daily Graphic apostrophised William Penney, the project’s leader: ‘Britain and the Commonwealth owe a debt – almost impossible to repay – to you ... the fact that you and your team have made it possible for Britain to make and store atom bombs has made the country a world power once ...”

“... hellish cacophony of sounds, ranging from screaming rabbits to Buddhist chants. The FBI director, William Sessions, began to worry that his men were suffering from fatigue. Concluding that no more cult members would be released, Sessions and Janet Reno, the newly-appointed Attorney-General who was in overall charge of the operation, decided to smoke out the ...”

“... his special friend and constant adviser, the former advertising mogul he made director of the CIA, William Casey. Casey and the gang of right-wing fanatics he quickly promoted to the White House were obsessed with the clandestine. They didn’t think much of elected politicians, and preferred to carry out their policies ...”

“... local Powhatans, pitied as benighted pagans. The other two graves were of military captains: William West, killed fighting the Powhatans, and Gabriel Archer, an enemy of Captain John Smith, a self-aggrandising swashbuckler and leader of the Virginia Colony. All four died between 1608 or 1610, years remembered as ‘the starving time’, when desperate ...”

“... novel that Sasnal started to get noticed ten years ago. Blowing up Spiegelman’s black and white frames with their captions removed, Sasnal nudged at the story’s grim content with the tersest of signifiers. One way, this was a quizzical take on the notion that painting might report on history: another, it was a fan’s tribute handiwork. So much in ...”