“... her now-or-never haste and her ill-lit parlours, barns and school corridors, she is a model of the self-taught photographer. But when Sinéty fetched up in Poilley, she had already studied painting and drawing at the elite Arts Deco in Paris. She had recently got hold of a Nikon single lens reflex camera and was keeping copious notes on the results of her ...”

“... of Crime and Punishment’, he suggests, is ‘that we care about the wellbeing of a calculating, self-absorbed hatchet-murderer.’ I’m not sure I care about Raskolnikov’s wellbeing, although that is certainly an imaginable response. I feel more like his guilty accomplice, in spite of my resistance to the idea. I’m attracted to Belknap’s claim that ...”

“... and Catherine Coulson, aka the Log Lady. That wasn’t the only way in which Lynch seemed more self-referential and ruminative than before, or to be addressing the world beyond the fantasy. History had, in some ways, caught up with Twin Peaks: Jerry Horne was now in the legal weed business, Dr Jacoby was broadcasting anti-corporate rants online, Sheriff ...”

“... great himself. And why not? Shouldn’t the person being toasted be allowed to express her ghostly self? At Elizabeth Jane Howard’s, the voice of the dearly departed couldn’t have been more distinctive. (By the way, is the departed a victim, as in a victim of death, or merely a passive recipient? Not to sound like an ad for Center Parcs, but does one ...”

“... is to be read differently depending on the shape and size of the bubble that encases it. Some are self-explanatory: a spiky bubble indicates exclamation. Others are less clear: a voice ‘echoing in the head’ – a deity perhaps, or a malevolent spirit – appears as free-floating text encircled by thin strokes. The subtle, percussive style of manpu sets ...”

“... jollies or visiting their aunts in Ramat Ha-Sharon. This is tourism responding to Israel’s self-marketing as a ‘true crossroads of the world’. The government has been at pains to sell itself as a normal, fun country: it can host the Eurovision song contest! Or a stage of the Giro d’Italia! It can put on a fantastic Pride Parade, and lure Jennifer ...”

“... the can-can in La Boutique fantasque – were no longer in touch; she thought he was ambitious and self-centred. But her personality on stage had helped shape Massine’s conception of what was possible in dance. She showed me a photograph on the mantelpiece: it was of a drawing depicting herself and Massine dancing the can-can, inscribed: ‘Pour Lydia en ...”

“... more conventional documentary sources, his account is bogged down in irrelevant editorialising, self-conscious asides and strange literary detours; most egregiously, his analytical approach erases the very workers he claims to want to rescue from historical oblivion. He construes the Chinese state’s willingness to send workers to France as part of its ...”

“... be a winter where nothing and nobody works. The government paints strikes as cynical ploys for self-enrichment, but they are motivated by workload – intensified as a result of budget cuts – as much as by wages. So far, public sympathy seems on their side: the slogan ‘enough is enough’ resonates well beyond union members.Truss didn’t create these ...”

“... it will be hemmed in again, the frigidarium will be re-covered, and Cluny will return to its true self. Perhaps. Stranger things have happened here. But Desmoulin’s brief is for this century: ‘to offer to the public those services and amenities nowadays considered the mark of a great national museum’. In other words, a visitor centre with the holy ...”

“... were putting on plays about asylum. But German perspectives on the crisis were sober and often self-congratulatory. They rarely spoke to the negotiations and absurdities of leaving one’s country. This carnival of well-meaning had a fetishistic quality that wasn’t lost on Syrians. In a series of interviews with Arab writers in Germany, published in ...”

“... adjuncts to sacred art. If the assertive new somebodies of the 15th century wanted a licence for self-promotion, they could turn to Jesus balancing the things that are Caesar’s against the things that are God’s, legitimising both. Why not supplement the carved and painted saints in church with secular portraits that referred back to imperial imagines? A ...”

“... users.’ So now I was the troll? Me, with my burner, my bugging device, my fake account and my self-righteous mission? It was an outrage.The advice from my publishers was just to move on. It was not worth the effort required to get these kinds of account taken down. But I was already in too deep. I started up another, different, fake Instagram account ...”

“... is not unaware of the potential drawbacks of this approach. At various points she flirts with self-parody. LeVon, for instance, with her piles of research boxes (and the Woolybucket Compendium that she’ll ‘never’ get done), is clearly a kind of author-figure, and on various occasions Bob’s impatience at being presented with yet another nugget of ...”

“... power to control completely or to predict reliably, great works of art can break the circle of self-love which is often exceptionally tough in people of this type. The urge to possess begins to get out of hand, and the collector or owner is himself possessed. The paintings of racehorses by Stubbs, informed by an almost clinical aesthetic that reflects ...”