“... CDs – the songs of Gerald Finzi, Vaughan Williams, George Butterworth, Gurney, Ernest Farrar. (The baritone Stephen Varcoe is unsurpassed in this repertoire.) I have but to hear the dark opening bars of Finzi’s ‘Only a Man Harrowing Clods’ to dissolve in sticky war nostalgia and an engorged, unseemly longing for things unseen.Yet ...”

“... it was Anita Brookner.’ The young man, who seemed remarkably undeferential, said security may have thought it was a device. The Queen said: ‘Yes. That is exactly what it is. A book is a device to ignite the imagination.’ The footman said: ‘Yes, maam.’ It was as if he was talking to his grandmother, and not for the first time the Queen was made ...”

“... mothers are an essential item of equipment in any psyche, and that though relations with mothers may be difficult or even dreadful, attachment to them is mandatory. They also know, as a corollary, that a denial of attachment is a failure to confront the reality of mother-attachment.‘You must find it very disturbing.’‘No, I find it ...”