“... music was a long-cherished ambition of Giuseppi Baretti, the Italian writer and friend of Samuel Johnson, who had lived in London since 1751. After much thought, Baretti commissioned the music from François-André Danican Philidor, the French operatic composer (celebrated also for his prowess at chess). Philidor worked in Paris on what was to be his major ...”

“... dynasties jostle for position in the commercial Promised Land of mid-Sixties America: Howard Johnson and his lifelong assistant and companion Mildred, both in their declining years, continue to drive the length and breadth of the land in search of the mysteriously (but potently) right locations for the units of their colossal motel-chain; Margery ...”

“... to fry). To write about the works of Hazlitt, one needs a bias towards history and philosophy. David Bromwich’s study concentrates on the latter discipline, for he is appraising Hazlitt’s understanding of Abstract Ideas and his command of words to express them. But there is also a historical theme running through this excellent book, accompanying the ...”

“... Some sixty years ago, when David Thomson was a boy, he suffered from a condition that badly affected his eyesight. He could see, but poorly. He read Braille and, though this was forbidden, the printed page. On two occasions, when the condition grew worse, he was condemned to spend six weeks at a time lying on his back in a darkened room ...”

“... Cowdrey let him down. When the MCC’s handling of the affair provoked a members’ revolt, led by David Sheppard and Mike Brearley, this, Oborne claims, ‘put the wind up’ Cowdrey, who clearly wanted to placate everybody. In the end, oddly, Cowdrey took D’Oliveira to Alec Douglas-Home’s London flat, where Home told him to stick to cricket and let ...”

“... have many gratifications but the comfort of life is at an end.’ His friend and master, Samuel Johnson, is dead. His ‘valuable spouse’, a spouse much deserted, has just suffered a slow and harrowing death from consumption, and he has to contend with expressions of sorrow and remorse: ‘the sad recollection of my irreparable loss hung at my heart. I ...”

“... In​ 2019, Boris Johnson became prime minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. In 2020, he shrank into being prime minister of England. For the second time in less than seven years, the union is in trouble. But this time the problem needs a new question. Forget: ‘Should Scotland be independent?’ The Scots will take care of that ...”

“... feature.The new arrangements got off to a sticky start. No sooner was the chamber unveiled than Johnson abandoned his scheme for Allegra Stratton, his chief spokesman, to give daily televised press conferences, suddenly realising that a badly managed press conference could blow any passing contretemps up into a scalding embarrassment. Instead, the lectern ...”

“... By​ far the worst appointment made by Boris Johnson in his cabinet reshuffle last month was that of Anne-Marie Trevelyan as secretary of state for international development. An ardent Brexiteer, Trevelyan has no known interest in overseas development; just about her only previous public utterance on the subject was an observation that ‘charity begins at home ...”

“... forced the early historians of English literature such as Thomas Warton, Thomas Percy and Samuel Johnson to review the grounds of their judgments. He is at the same time the lonely outsider commemorated by Coleridge, Keats, Shelley and (more cannily) Wordsworth. David Fairer maintains that their Wertherisation of ...”

“... those who support Save Britain’s Heritage know only too well. We live in a retrospective age and David Lowenthal’s discursive study is a product of it. One of the attractions of this book is that it enables the Melton Constables of the world to be seen in the context of the future as well as the past. David Lowenthal is ...”

“... In the month​ leading up to the Chris Pincher scandal, which finally did for Boris Johnson, there was a flurry of bleak news about the state and future of the British economy. Inflation hit a forty-year high of 9.1 per cent, and the Bank of England announced its fifth interest rate rise since December, to 1.25 per cent ...”

“... rid me of religious belief. This is a long route to declaring my interest in these books. Paul Johnson’s The Quest for God is part of a noble tradition in which laymen have written devotional treatises. The layman explains his love of God, and his fondness for his ecclesiastical tradition. The high point was reached more than three hundred years ago when ...”

“... but continued with the motorcade, had lunch as planned at the Trade Mart, went on to Austin and Johnson’s ranch; went shooting with Johnson the following morning. For various reasons, this story is more real than anything else in the novel; an eloquent and moving representation of our disbelief. For the rest, in the ...”

“... I realise this will probably sound absurd, especially to those Brexiteer politicians like Boris Johnson who have been assiduously channelling Churchill’s spirit for so long they can scarcely remember what the point is anymore. May, with her pinched, airless, bureaucratic approach to Brexit looks to them like a modest little woman with a great deal to be ...”