“... in which reconciliation has been attempted. They are linked by the idea that restitution may provide an effective model for their resolution (and the resolution of other historical conflicts). Preceded and followed by forays into the theory of restitution, the main text is divided into two parts. In Part One Barkan considers the aftermath of World ...”

“... and desire targets it, emotion tints or colours it: it enlivens it or darkens it, as the case may be.’ Without the map that belief provides, there would be nothing for desire to target; and without the targets that desires provide, there would be neither the satisfaction nor the frustration from which emotion as an attitude could form. However distinct ...”

“... and the rhythms of Irish speech, somewhat in the manner of J.M. Synge, and nowadays this style may sound archaic or affected. She is still remembered as the part author, with Yeats, of Cathleen ni Houlihan, a propagandist play of 1902 – a vehicle for Maud Gonne, who played Cathleen – that has not lost all its patriotic force. The old rows, chiefly over ...”

“... thinking, reality is seen as a complex system of correspondences in which given components may throw light on their counterparts or actually symbolise them. Leviticus, then, in Douglas’s view, is not in its deepest concerns a series of regulations for butchering sacrificial animals, purifying contaminated persons and substances, and keeping unfit ...”

“... Alice Vavasor leaves her second love to go back to the first, her father says: ‘But you may change your mind again.’ Alice found that this was hard to bear and hard to answer; but there was a certain amount of truth in the grievous reproach conveyed in her father’s words, which made her bow her neck to it. ‘I have no right to say that it is ...”

“... genes thought to be the evolutionary innovations of vertebrates have more ancient origins. Animals may in some instances discard genes as they become more complex. It would appear that in order to gain a true understanding of the genetic make-up of human beings, we will need to study a far greater range of organisms. Leroi, however, believes that if we are to ...”

“... from a Chinese stationer in New York. Much of the novel takes place inside this notebook, which may make it rather too enclosed and precious for some tastes. Yet it is, authentically, about the writer’s fear of claustrophobia, of getting trapped inside the fictional magic lantern show. And Auster’s ability as an illusionist makes the story always ...”

“... city’s main tourist attraction. Dr Tom Coburn, Oklahoma’s Republican candidate for the Senate, may be the most conservative candidate in the country. ‘No one gets to the right of the guy,’ a supporter says. Coburn is against condoms, embryonic stem-cell research, gay rights and government spending; and he favours ‘the death penalty for ...”

“... author was apparently familiar with the Wirral, wild territory at the time, we’re told, so he may have been an extremely gifted Merseysider. But Chaucer had the advantage of speaking the English of London, from which modern English descends. Gawain is linguistically a far tougher proposition, and only specialists can comfortably read it, so there already ...”

“... for dominance. Eventually, the English won out; that we know well enough. But what we may not fully appreciate, according to Hoffer, is the extent to which their winning depended on ‘sensory imperialism’. In short, they succeeded (in large part) by forcing their own pattern of sensory experience on their Indian counterparts. How, exactly, did ...”

“... and patience for piecemeal communities to get to the point of being regarded seriously, but that may be on its way. The so-called ‘edge cities’, amalgams of super-sized shopping malls and office plazas that mushroomed sensationally round about 1980 near freeway junctions, are one symptom of that adjustment. Few new edge cities are taking shape ...”

“... give the poet’s ego a foothold, allow it to preen itself on self-denial. Ceasing to prattle may suggest that Thomas wants to put away childish things, but his praying self is clearly still miffed – the phrase ‘frosty silence’ is hovering behind the flower simile – and unsatisfied with grown-up isolation. Ironically, the effect of God’s silence ...”

“... it. She also admits to knowing the prisoners would be killed. They ‘all knew’. In doing so she may have displayed greater courage than her co-defendants, but her confessions also fail to strike the right note. ‘She admitted what was true and disputed what was not. Her arguments became more desperate and more vehement. She didn’t raise her voice, but ...”

“... in 1939, when Auden and Isherwood and Pears and Britten fled to America to escape it. This claim may not be quite groundless but it probably underestimates the complexity of the emigrants’ motives. And perhaps, as Morley believes, the police and the judiciary had been gradually getting tougher on homosexuals ever since the persecution of Wilde in ...”

“... going in 1932 to Geneva to report on the League of Nations World Disarmament Conference. This may have seemed like an opportunity to remedy some major errors – or, if you chose like Kennedy so to call them, the injustices – of Versailles. Great things were hoped for, and Kennedy’s own country was playing the leading role – how amazing now to ...”