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Short Cuts

Stephen Sedley: Labour and Anti-Semitism, 10 May 2018

“... and shoot down unarmed protesters, gets misdirected at Israelis’ cousins and co-religionists. Ferdinand Mount has described the Balfour Declaration of 1917 as ‘the last gasp of Edwardian nonchalance’, adding: ‘It is hard to imagine Palmerston or Peel launching into such a wild promise without thinking it through.’ But is it really right to ...”

Book Reviewing

Stefan Collini: On the ‘TLS’, 5 November 2020

“... in the 1980s it lost money every year and by 1990 circulation was down to 26,000 copies. When Ferdinand Mount was appointed editor in 1990 he diplomatically announced that, while contemplating some changes, he did not want to tamper with ‘the bedrock virtues of the paper – the comprehensive coverage, the adventurousness, the readiness to cover ...”

Drabble’s Progress

John Sutherland, 5 December 1991

The Gates of Ivory 
by Margaret Drabble.
Viking, 464 pp., £14.99, October 1991, 0 670 84270 2Show More
Happily Ever After 
by Jenny Diski.
Hamish Hamilton, 245 pp., £14.99, September 1991, 0 241 13169 3Show More
Of Love and Asthma 
by Ferdinand Mount.
Heinemann, 321 pp., £13.99, September 1991, 0 434 47993 4Show More
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“... it is probably more informative about asthma than love. Non-sufferers could usefully consult Mount’s novel for instruction on asthma pillows, inhalers, and the distinction between intrinsic and extrinsic conditions of the ailment. Asthma is hell on earth – but not without its compensating excitements. The narrative, which covers thirty years, begins ...”

At Home in the Huntington

John Sutherland: The Isherwood Archive, 10 June 1999

“... Fund to release money for the acquisition of the papers of living British authors. On 9 April, Ferdinand Mount used his pulpit in the TLS to add reasoned support for a long-term policy of preserving the national literary heritage in the copyright libraries – specifically by the acquisition of the materials of currently active writers. Clearly ...”

John Sturrock

Mary-Kay Wilmers, 21 September 2017

“... and it is so sad to think that I shall never hear his confidential voice over the telephone again. Ferdinand Mount I joined the TLS straight out of university in the 1990s, so only overlapped briefly with John, but he left a very deep impression on me, as he did on all who were lucky enough to meet him and work with him. When he decided to move to the ...”

Phut-Phut

James Wood: The ‘TLS’, 27 June 2002

Critical Times: The History of the ‘Times Literary Supplement’ 
by Derwent May.
HarperCollins, 606 pp., £25, November 2001, 0 00 711449 4Show More
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“... about world events, something it has continued to do very well under its now departing editor, Ferdinand Mount. May’s book ends with some good anecdotes. I liked his remarks about Nicolas Walter, the great epistolary rationalist, who was an editor at the TLS until contributors began to complain that he was randomly adding the names of famous ...”

What Matters

Walter Benn Michaels: Class Trumps Race, 27 August 2009

Who Cares about the White Working Class? 
edited by Kjartan Páll Sveinsson.
Runnymede Perspectives, 72 pp., January 2009, 978 1 906732 10 3Show More
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“... were the injury. It’s thus a relevant fact about Who Cares about the White Working Class? that Ferdinand Mount, who once advised Thatcher, is twice cited and praised here for condemning the middle class’s bad behaviour in displaying its open contempt for ‘working-class cultures’. He represents an improvement over those who seek to blame the poor ...”

Lucky Lad

Geoffrey Wheatcroft: Harold Evans, 17 December 2009

My Paper Chase: True Stories of Vanished Times – An Autobiography 
by Harold Evans.
Little, Brown, 515 pp., £25, September 2009, 978 1 4087 0203 1Show More
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“... decency and amiability of his origins. At the beginning of his own journalistic career, Ferdinand Mount somewhat incongruously worked at the tabloid Daily Sketch, under the man who later transformed the Daily Mail. In his memoir Cold Cream, Mount says drily that great editors are rarely nice men, ‘and David ...”

What’s wrong with the SDP?

Geoffrey Hawthorn, 21 November 1985

Capitalism and Social Democracy 
by Adam Przeworksi.
Cambridge, 269 pp., £25, May 1985, 0 521 26742 0Show More
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“... between new right and old left. But can it stay there, and should it? On the first question, as Ferdinand Mount reported – and of all the reports on the SDP’s Conference, only the Spectator’s had more than a sentence on its policy – the man who’s responsible for many of these ideas, Richard Layard, is suitably sceptical. But it may not be so ...”

It hurts, but it’s holy

Neal Ascherson: Consequences of Empire, 23 May 2024

Empireworld: How British Imperialism Has Shaped the Globe 
by Sathnam Sanghera.
Viking, 449 pp., £20, January, 978 0 241 60041 2Show More
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“... fell apart, and the Palestine sepsis never infected the motherland’s domestic politics.As Ferdinand Mount wrote here recently, ‘what seems to become clearer is the ultimate failure of the imperial ideal to take root in the popular imagination’ (LRB, 22 February). Myopic and flattering as their take on empire history has been, the Brits never ...”

Time to Mount Spain

Colin Burrow: Prince Charles’s Spanish Adventure, 2 September 2004

The Prince and the Infanta: The Cultural Politics of the Spanish Match 
by Glyn Redworth.
Yale, 200 pp., £25, November 2003, 0 300 10198 8Show More
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“... has unearthed in the British Library, he urged Buckingham that it was time for the prince to ‘mount’ Spain. In fact, Gondomar was seriously out of touch with opinion at home, and was more respected by James I than by his own king. He never appreciated that the marriage would be impossible without Charles’s conversion, or that the Spanish would demand ...”

But You Married Him

Rosemary Hill: Princess Margaret and Lady Anne, 4 June 2020

Lady in Waiting: My Extraordinary Life in the Shadow of the Crown 
by Anne Glenconner.
Hodder, 336 pp., £20, October 2019, 978 1 5293 5906 0Show More
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“... Ma’am Darling: 99 Glimpses of Princess Margaret, a witty life-in-anecdotes (reviewed by Ferdinand Mount in the LRB of 4 January 2018), is marketed by the publishers as ‘the hilarious, bestselling royal biography, perfect for fans of The Crown’.If Glenconner was angered by Ma’am Darling, she doesn’t say. As her memoir makes clear, her ...”

Diary

Alan Bennett: Selling my hair on eBay, 6 January 2022

“... ForteyTurning the Boat for Home, Richard MabeyThe Stonemason, Andrew ZiminskiKiss Myself Goodbye, Ferdinand MountWhat Is the Grass: Walt Whitman in My Life, Mark DotyPastoral, James RebanksPhilip Roth, Blake BaileyWilliam Golding, John Carey17 June. Rupert’s birthday. Rupert goes into the office for a meeting with the management of Condé Nast and, after 21 ...”

Reflections on the Independence Referendum

“... by Ascherson). ‘No’ to independence must also mean ‘Yes’ to serious democratic reform. Ferdinand Mount All​ classical accounts see England as the original and model nation-state of modern times. One way of looking at the 18 September vote is that it’s a sign of the end of this model. Throughout the past era, the vital questions were posed ...”

Flaubert at Two Hundred

Julian Barnes: Flaubert, the Parrot and Me, 16 December 2021

“... ReaderAt a noisy party many years ago, I was talking to my fellow novelist (and LRB contributor) Ferdinand Mount, who told me that he reread Madame Bovary every year, as both a literary duty and a pleasure. I was mightily impressed – he’d therefore doubtless read it many more times than I had – and carried this detail around for years. I was ...”

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