“... the eyeholes, her mouth unsmiling under the little slit. She looks as though she has been forced by agents of an authoritarian, anti-individualistic ideology to cover her face in a way she doesn’t want to, but is putting up with it because she doesn’t think she has a choice. At least she’s wearing the right flag. Last spring, Park View was in the news ...”

“... re-election in 1959 of a Conservative government under Harold Macmillan that this stance changed. By 1960, the poor performance of the British economy compared with those of the six countries that had created the European Economic Community (EEC) was plain and, strongly encouraged by the Kennedy administration in ...”

“... of memory. Perhaps even a memorial. Except that I don’t believe in biographies and advise you to be especially sceptical about this one, written, one has to say, under the stress of illness and in extreme haste. Self-perception is distorted enough in the healthy, God knows what it is like in those gripped by terminal ...”

“... He left three accounts of their meeting in Algiers; some of what he said was later hotly denied by Douglas. The first account, written the following day, was to his mother. He explained to her that he had, after much consideration, decided to return to the hotel and miss his train, as he did not want Wilde to think he was avoiding him. ‘This terrible ...”

“... Six years after the death of 72 people in the fire that consumed Grenfell Tower in London, fed by cheap cladding that acted like solid petrol, the owners of the freehold on Morris’s building and the Manchester fire service had decided it was too dangerous for the occupants of its 107 flats to stay in their homes. They were told to evacuate at once and ...”

“... certain to go ahead early in my time frame (most trials are plea-bargained out), and I had to be in New Orleans for a talk three weeks later. That gave me the bare bones of an itinerary.I left New York at the beginning of October and headed for Chicago. The day before I arrived, ICE agents conducted a raid on a South Side apartment building, with agents ...”

“... he trample all over the distinctions, the reticences and borderlines, you set so much store by in your own verse?Yes. I suppose that is where the whole idea of confessional poetry came from. There are two factors with Lowell: one is that his family is a famous one, he had a famous name. So to have a Lowell write derisively about his father as Lowell the ...”

“... of the 21st century as a paragon of the international virtues: a community of values … held up by Europeans and non-Europeans alike as an exemplar for all to emulate’.1 The reputation, he assures us, is ‘well-earned’. The same vision grips the seers of New Labour. Why Europe Will Run the 21st Century declaims the title of a manifesto ...”

“... to a reluctant end. Clear-sighted about what was coming under Yeltsin, Furman would henceforward be the best native analyst of Russia’s post-communism. But that was not his only change of direction in 1991. Political commentary, punctual or long-range, was one thing, comparative inquiry of the kind that had driven his studies of religion was another. Where ...”

“... to travel, work and study across the continent in their millions? If Britain is straining the EU by leaving, Law and Justice’s Poland is straining it by staying, attacking the EU’s contradictory institutional positions – its promotion of human rights, its secularism and multiculturalism, its belief in state ...”

“... By 1945, the era of Gandhi was over, and that of Nehru had begun. It is conventional to dwell on the contrasts between the two, but the bearing of these on the outcome of the struggle for independence has remained by and large in the shadows. Nor are the contrasts themselves always well captured ...”

“... of Kashmiri Muslims. Recently returned from a visit to the country, he had been ‘deeply moved’ by the suffering he had witnessed and was now convinced that ‘the moral leadership of the world must take up this issue.’ The beards nodded vigorously. They recalled no doubt the help the ‘moral leadership’ had given in Kabul and Kosovo. The Congressman ...”

“... of fortune and opinion: it was once a hideout for anti-Saddam insurgents, whom he punished by draining the marshes. He also killed many of them, and buried their bodies in mass graves around the city. But by the time the 1st Battalion of the Coldstream Guards were operating out of Camp Abu Naji, it was the British ...”

“... Spain, past the Bay of Biscay, through the Channel and into the North Sea. It was bound for Hull. By lunchtime on 6 May, more than a month after setting out from Vietnam, it was steaming up the Humber.I wanted to confirm what was on board, so I looked on the internet and found a pub, the Humber Tavern, in the village of Paull, that seemed to have a good view ...”

“... ten hours a week as a cleaner; they otherwise rely on benefits. As the children get older she’ll be able to work more hours, but there’s little chance she’ll ever be able to afford to rent even a two-bedroom flat nearby on the open market and still have money left to feed and clothe herself and the girls.Along with ...”