“... Responsibility of Intellectuals’ (1967). ‘The question “What have I done?” is one that we may well ask ourselves,’ Chomsky wrote, ‘as we read each day of fresh atrocities in Vietnam – as we create, or mouth, or tolerate the deceptions that will be used to justify the next defence of freedom.’ Chomsky’s route to this position began with his ...”

“... composer. According to the Times, reviewing his memorial concert in 1934, ‘whatever else he may be Delius is not an acquired taste.’ His music either ‘captivates at once and those who have been captivated may go on to discern new varieties within the rather limited range of emotions it represents’ – or it does ...”

“... the fragment and then an attempt to complete and translate it. The book’s author, Charles Adams, may have been trying to compensate for the flimsy plot. Twin girls, who share a psychic ability to feel each other’s pain, are separated as children when the younger, Catherine, is stolen by Gypsies. The elder, Gertie, grows up and gets married but is always ...”

“... in their tender psyches’. A faint irony in the presentation of this thought tells us that Paudi may be a bit too correct and modern, and Buzzati later spells out what may be his own point of view, highlighting the ‘irresistible arguments which so-called progress always marshals to dismantle the last fortresses of ...”

“... in Atlanta but his associates are still known to whip out their tommy guns when provoked, and they may or may not be behind the bomb that gets rolled under Stuffy Keegan’s hooch wagon one fine day. But they can be friendly enough, at least with a guy like Hicks, who’s happy shooting the breeze with an old goombah like ...”

“... let alone internationally, would have been very small indeed. The new ‘military humanism’ may have its rational advocates but they are hugely outnumbered by the sceptics, who refuse to believe that governments commit their armies unilaterally to a war for any such generous purpose. It’s not in any case as if we had to wait for American and British ...”

“... words appear in the same order in both poems – was some kind of April Fool. Zadie Smith, who may or may not still count as a new writer (maybe she enjoys the increasingly common distinction of being both new and established simultaneously), hasn’t contributed to New Writing 10; but then she’s been busy editing an ...”

“... have seemed to some people as if Christmas had come early. Too early, perhaps. Madeleine Albright may have had this in mind when she said in the Fox News green room last month: ‘Do you suppose that the Bush Administration has Osama bin Laden hidden away somewhere and will bring him out before the election?’ She claims that she was joking; Fox journalist ...”

“... first small piece of faulty seamanship was a farce from beginning to end. The second small piece may not have begun as a farce but it certainly ended as one, when the 15 sailors and marines who had been taken into charge by the Iranians were flamboyantly released, wearing the not too ill-fitting new suits that they had been given, rather as if they too were ...”

“... one as considerably less silly when removed to the context of John McGahern’s fiction. One may never know why the narrator of McGahern’s new novel chooses to write pornography for a Dublin magazine – one may never quite believe that such a decent sad fellow would so choose – but, such is the prevalent ...”

“... only a gang of implausible heroes – the pistol-packing, cowboy-like racoon called Rocket may have the edge here – can save us. The days of the lone rescuer are gone. Well, not quite. There is Captain Marvel (Brie Larsen), who shot her part in Endgame before her own film came out earlier this year. There is a real doubt here. Captain Marvel saves ...”

“... portrait, and was instead painted some years later, or the Flight is not by Titian. The problem may not be evident to most visitors to the exhibition, simply because it is very hard, from the pictures on display, to gain a clear idea of what an early Titian looks like. This is a reflection of recent writing on the artist, in which the number and variety of ...”

“... Church for the sake of freedom and humanity end by flinging away freedom and humanity if only they may fight the Church … The secularists have not wrecked divine things; but the secularists have wrecked secular things, if that is any comfort to them.’ Many liberal warriors are so eager to fight anti-democratic fundamentalism that they end up dispensing ...”

“... they failed to move that forward. Erdogan’s irate response to the House resolution suggests this may not work. It was inevitable that Turkey’s ambassador in Washington would be recalled. But Erdogan also remarked that Turkey had 100,000 illegal Armenian immigrants and could deport them any time it chose, a comment so ill-conceived that it aroused a storm ...”

“... some idea of the texture of everyday life in Nebuchadnezzar’s Babylon. The majority of tablets may be the equivalent of office files – letters, legal documents, contracts, mortgages, lists of goods – but there are also messages addressed to the gods, some of them expressing indignance that good behaviour has not been rewarded. Astronomical observations ...”