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“... Passion and scholarship may enhance each other’s effects,’ E.M. Forster noted in his Commonplace Book with A.E. Housman in mind. Forster was always keen to reduce the incompatibles in life: Housman was less persuaded by such redemptive harmonies. He preferred the losing paradoxes to the winning ones: ‘ “Whoever shall save his life shall lose it, and whosoever will lose his life shall find it ...”

“... flow.The problem is compounded by the often contrasting forms of competence in play. One writer may be an accomplished biographer, but without any real expertise in the field in which their current subject worked. Another may be a fellow specialist working on the same material and issues as their subject, but lacking any ...”

“... the theologically orthodox doctrine Of eternal punishment of the damned? Let’s see. There may be sand among the pages Of a travel guide to Egypt or even a dead flea That once bit the ass of the mysterious Abigail Who scribbled her name teasingly with an eye pencil. June Evening The way that bat brushed my hair, It ...”

“... consumerism, an age whose dominant trope is anti-climax. ‘On Mr Milton’s Paradise Lost’ may nonetheless seem to confirm the stock views of Marvell and Milton: Marvell stands apart from the sublime solemnity of his friend, ironically distancing himself from his achievements. According to T.S. Eliot, Milton’s Puritan republicanism destroyed his ...”

“... figure at her side. It was an impression that Willy himself did nothing to discourage and may even have nurtured. He managed with consummate ease to give a sense of perfect loyalty and to induce, simultaneously, the niggling thought of what she’d be getting up to if he weren’t around. It was an impressive piece of political juggling. Now that the ...”

“... in a recording studio and a band fronted by the Mael brothers is ready to work. They ask ‘So, may we start?’ and then, for the next four and a half minutes, sing a song called ‘So May We Start’ accompanied by the leading actors. This isn’t quite the beginning of the movie, since we have already heard Carax tell ...”

“... moves repeatedly surprised and wrong-footed friends and enemies alike, both at home and abroad. He may seem an improbable model for political strategising in the era of Twitter and Cambridge Analytica, but it is one of Cummings’s core convictions that sources which may seem, as he puts it, ‘very esoteric’ can turn out ...”

“... the US turned down Iran’s offer to discuss security matters, including the nuclear programme, in May 2003. It is highly unlikely that the present US administration would be interested in negotiating along these lines. Another possibility is for the Security Council to limit Iran’s right to enrich uranium to a level of, say, 5 per cent, sufficient for fuel ...”

“... they might have been, considering Gabriele’s flat was raided by the Vatican gendarmerie on 23 May and several boxes of stolen documents were confiscated), but Nuzzi soon gets down to business. In May 2009, Dino Boffo, the editor of the Catholic paper Avvenire, suggested that Silvio Berlusconi ought to lead a more sober ...”

“... critical examination of the causes of the events of 11 September and the role US foreign policy may have played. Another indictment of Middle East studies appeared in Martin Kramer’s Ivory Towers on Sand: The Failure of Middle Eastern Studies in America, published in October 2001 by the pro-Israel Washington Institute for Near East Policy. Kramer, who ...”

“... on earth that I had Covid-19 in the middle of March, that I had a positive antibody test in May and that I’m probably no more vulnerable than he is. But the letters keep coming. I somehow failed to become a statistic last year.I had hoped that proof I’d had the virus would be cause for celebration, perhaps some envy, and a thorough loosening of the ...”

“... a lot harder than we usually do about what it means to bear or bring up a child, and what a child may need to know or dream about its parents. In a wonderful scene, which I won’t describe in detail because I’d be giving too much away, the major issue becomes that of talking to children who are too young to understand speech of any kind. What do you say to ...”

“... not the ordinary vocabulary of modern realism. We start to wonder if there may be such a thing as a gothic comedy of psychological manners. Certainly there are people here who try to steal or manage the emotional lives of others, and do it as a form of deluded kindness or wisdom. But there are even more people who will have no life at ...”

“... a whole category of art which, prior to any particular discriminations, is lost on him: try as he may, or may not, he can’t see much in it. This is a generic portrait of a critic who ‘doesn’t like contemporary art’, drawn to clarify a professional dilemma. What is this critic to do? Or what’s to be done with ...”

“... feet across. This suggests that they were conceived together; some historians have thought they may have hung in the same room; the inventory almost says so, but not quite. It is striking that there is no trace of a pendant to Mars – the god’s singularity matters. But for the moment I want to focus on the quality of the two ...”