“... the mid-18th century. For his part, Tharoor cannot forbear to praise the achievements of men like Arthur Cotton, whose Godavari Delta irrigation scheme remains much as he left it in 1852. Lalvani’s enthusiasm is winning, but his splendid list of British engineering achievements cannot disguise the reality that for far too long all the steel for rails and ...”

“... The British governors in the 1920s and 1930s, Sir Ronald Storrs, Edward Keith-Roach OBE and Sir Arthur Wauchope, had much the same experience as Queen Michal. Simon Sebag Montefiore in his biography of the city rather wistfully describes their rule as a golden age in Jerusalem’s history, when decorous gatherings of religious leaders from all faiths might ...”

“... first mentor in what he called the ‘fantastic American science of showbusiness’ was his uncle Arthur, an antiques dealer friendly with Maurice Chevalier and Josephine Baker. Arthur introduced him to the circus, then to nightclubs and music halls. As de Baecque points out, Melville’s gangster films invariably include a ...”

“... the scheme was used to retrieve tax from people in arrears: what they owed was deducted from the cash component of the wage. ‘There are no words harsh enough,’ he wrote, ‘to condemn such cruelty.’ Because he understood the markets in grain and fruit, and the way the government could set the price to fleece the producer, the comprehensive New ...”

“... when a single diary would have sufficed. To ask the forger to fake the other two diaries and the cash register (and if one was forged all of them were) would have been simply to ask for detection, because a single mistake in any of them would have destroyed the whole ugly enterprise. Besides, where could the money have been found? Government servants may ...”

“... Jesús and Alonzo, are addicts, and so are all his friends. No one works: they scrape up cash from odd jobs, washing cars, carrying shopping bags, cleaning yards for a propina (tip) of twenty or thirty pesos. As soon as they’ve got fifty or a hundred they race off to the dealers – the puchador, a Hispanisation of ‘pusher’ – then run home ...”

“... Aviv’s Habima Theatre. He played the gay prisoner in Kiss of the Spider Woman; he performed in Arthur Miller’s A View from the Bridge and Tony Kushner’s Angels in America. As Othello, he nearly strangled the actress playing Desdemona: an ambulance had to be called to resuscitate her. He often got into brawls: with directors, actors, even members of the ...”

“... Carter that Brzezinski’s anti-Soviet obsession would imperil détente and told the historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr that Brzezinski was a ‘fool’ and a ‘menace’ with ‘absolutely no understanding of the Russians’. The establishment had their own representative in Cyrus Vance, a Second World War veteran, Wall Street lawyer and professional ...”

“... your home as a volatile asset. The canny speculator should be alert for the optimum moment to cash in. Three-bed flats are on offer at £750,000. The average rent in the street is calculated at £1666 per month. Inspired by this febrile vision, householders dig. There are seven basement excavations in progress. Wilberforce Road is unlisted and schemes for ...”

“... hack government propagandist paid out of secret service money, information I picked up first from Arthur Aspinall’s now venerable book Politics and the Press. Taylor’s name appears in the records of the payments he received alongside little identifying phrases such as ‘Mr Taylor who writes in the papers’; ‘for writing in the papers’. Thereafter ...”

“... I send off my next property tax bill.When we finish our sweep and I’m swaying groggily at the cash register – my mother slumped in her chair behind me like a satisfied pythoness – I’m forced to confront a terrible possibility: that Mavis and I may actually be more alike than I prefer to believe. (B. has sometimes intimated as much.) Even as the ...”

“... to Florida, where, in their latest turn of fortune, they were given a house in Coconut Grove by Arthur Curtiss James, a multimillionaire who had financed some of David’s astronomical expeditions.Of all those​ affected by ‘the war between the houses’, as the feud between the Todds and Dickinsons became known in Amherst, Millicent was the greatest ...”

“... with sand or earth, made by the Leeds company Hesco Bastion. Edward Shewell’s youngest son, Arthur, a lieutenant-colonel, was killed in Kandahar in 1880, rescuing a wounded comrade outside the Kabul Gate. His father didn’t live long enough to hear about it; he died in 1878, two years after the town commissioners were replaced by a more democratic ...”

“... it printed or cyclostyled?Oh, printed.Who printed it?Some local printer. We all saved up our cash. It came out for two issues.And you timed it deliberately to rival the school magazine?Yes. I got into a lot of trouble.I remember your telling me that the magazine was called the ‘Scorpion’, is that right? No doubt because scorpions sting, inject poison ...”

“... all we see of him.’ ‘Is it Ransom as in king’s?’ said the constable. ‘Or Ransome as in Arthur?’ ‘Partridge is one of our graduate entrants,’ said the sergeant, examining the front door. ‘Lock not forced, I see. He’s just climbing the ladder. There wouldn’t be such a thing as a cup of tea, would there?’ ‘No,’ said Mr Ransome ...”