“... it in their guts. Such a turning can be made only by a comprehensive constitutional effort – a self-reform in which, incidentally, the UK crown and royal family now has a minor role. It has to extend from reform of the parliamentary system to a reconciliation with the Aboriginal population. That was the point of Germaine Greer’s recent admirable polemic ...”

“... as saving, for example. In the tradition of Adam Smith, this proposal relies more on national self-interest than on virtue, and would need relatively little international co-operation to function. But more often Stiglitz’s reforms ask for permanent international bureaucracies to be set up: a judicial body to determine whether trade barriers are ...”

“... a collector or connoisseur. In the middle of this peculiar book Clark drifts from the diarist’s self-communion to an after-dinner speech to old comrades and delivers his ‘inevitable 1960s anecdote’. Standing on the steps of the National Gallery, at the ‘edge of a demonstration’, he discusses ‘the (sad) necessity of iconoclasm in a revolutionary ...”

“... conundrum of his popularity, but biography – with its focus on the conscious and acting self – just isn’t the best optic through which to examine that question. Of course, Taylor ‘made’ his media career, and Wrigley’s tales of his canny pursuit of publishers and Burk’s columns of figures show how he did it, but a certain media culture ...”

“... A few of my own complaints: Krauss has written beautifully (in Bachelors, 1999) about the self-portrait photography of the Surrealist Claude Cahun; in a book already in danger of scanting women artists active before the 1960s, the omission of Cahun is striking. It is odd, too, given the book’s pervasive interest in the impact of Freudianism on the ...”

“... based on the fact that I was prepared to listen to such people.’ Not a very sensible thing for a self-styled elder statesman to say. Paul Scheffer, a left-wing columnist with political ambitions who became famous by taking a very public stance against multiculturalism, grew quite excited when Michael Ignatieff’s name came up in his conversation with ...”

“... the miner in ‘The Closing down of Summer’, ‘I must always be careful of sloppiness and self-indulgence lest they cost me dearly in the end.’ This could serve as MacLeod’s own manifesto: a declaration in favour of absolute simplicity, one opposed to the whole idea of ‘literariness’. The paradox is that the spareness of MacLeod’s style is ...”

“... American reputation. For the first third of this slim book, his tone alternates between fond self-mockery of his youthful passion for Allende and a bristling defence of ‘that momentous point’ in the history of Chile and indeed the world: ‘For many millions around the world, Chile briefly shined as a beacon of inspiration. It gave life to the notion ...”

“... of exposition to make it available to a broad public. This is history meant to matter to the self-comprehension and self-definition of a people, but its central argument is questionable to an even greater extent than its author’s dexterity in anticipating criticism allows. The title is, of course, a sidelong ...”

“... rebellion against Julius Caesar in the late 50s BC. Vercingetorix is written up in Caesar’s own self-serving account of the Gallic War as a traitor and Gallic nationalist, who was resoundingly outmanoeuvred by Roman tactics at the Battle of Alesia; he surrendered to Caesar and was packed off to Rome, to be killed several years later as part of the ...”

“... almost universally believed that Cicero had died an exemplary death. Whatever accusations of self-interest, vacillation or cowardice they might level at other aspects of his life, everyone reckoned that on this occasion he behaved splendidly: sticking his bare neck out of the litter, he calmly demanded (as heroes have continued to do ever since) that the ...”

“... and ubiquity in the United States of a legal education, in other contexts the mark of cabalistic self interest, becomes a badge of political freedom. The third is a culture of consent. No state can endure unless its people accepts that their representatives speak for them, rather than simply at them. The dilemma of modern democracy, as Siedentop (following ...”

“... in his treatment of Shaw’s sexuality and the influence of Shaw’s lovers, friends, family and self on his work. Shaw claimed that his active sex life began at the age of 29 and ended 14 years later; for Holroyd, the chaos of Shaw’s early affairs, the celibacy of his marriage and the wild romantic agonies of his later attachments (usually to ...”

“... horticultural phase taste like pumpkins, the liqueur they distil in the cellar explodes, their self-medication makes them ill, and so on. And when, later, they move up from more or less scientific experiments to start dabbling in the humanities, developing tastes and ambitions in literature, education, even politics, we can be sure in advance that every ...”

“... pipeline that would run from Iran, through Shia-dominated Iraq, to Syria; in November 2005 a self-defence pact was signed which allows Iran to store weapons, sensitive equipment and hazardous material on Syrian soil; Iran’s ambassador in Beirut promised to counter an Israeli attack on Syria with ‘full power’. The links are theological, too. When I ...”