“... to discover the Counter-Reformation is a very old one, first advanced by the Elizabethan Jesuit Robert Parsons. In a lengthy memorandum he composed in the 1590s, sketching out a reform agenda should Elizabeth be succeeded by a Catholic, Parsons suggested that Mary’s attempt to reimpose Catholicism had failed because it was ‘huddled’ and ‘shuffled up ...”

“... plans for a new show set in an alternative reality, in which the Confederate South, led by General Robert E. Lee, has successfully seceded from the Union. D.B. Weiss, one of the producers of Confederate, explained the thinking behind the series: ‘What would the world have looked like if Lee had sacked DC, if the South had won – that just always fascinated ...”

“... between this foreign policy crisis and domestic democratic politics. That is the main concern of Robert Crowcroft’s new book, but there may also be broader lessons, of relevance to Britain’s present predicament. A core assumption of those who write about the ‘appeasement’ crisis has always been that it does indeed ...”

“... while levying heavy tariffs to protect landowners’ profits. Liberals, and liberal Tories like Robert Peel, realised that slimming the state allowed them to defend it better against this radical critique. After the 2008 financial crisis, the Conservative political strategy of ‘austerity’ meant that Labour could be identified as irresponsible high ...”

“... that this is not an issue which I am strongly minded to open up at this stage,’ and ends with ‘may I reiterate’ thanks to me for chairing the 1991-93 Royal Commission on Criminal Justice (which is, I suppose, all the nicer since in fact it’s the first thanks I’ve had from him). He tells me to go and talk to John Wakeham, which I do. Wakeham is as ...”

“... from the near town ... And yet this is the poet who quotes with solemn approval: Beauty it may be is the meet of lines, Or careful-spacèd sequences of sound. Well, to be sure: but what happens to ‘the meet of lines’ at ‘wheelbarrow/paths’, and ‘but/out’ and ‘were/barred’? Grigson’s precepts are often admirable, but they are ...”

“... activité, vitesse!’ Similar, too, was Cromwell’s disregard for casualties. Milder historians may argue that the massacres at Drogheda and Wexford during his conquest of Ireland in 1649 were ‘typical casualties of 17th-century warfare’. But even they find it hard to stomach Cromwell’s pious crowing over the Irish, his determination to see his ...”

“... work. The contract – agreed without any competitive tendering – was signed in early May but, unusually, backdated to 17 March, two days before Lee Cain’s Zoom call. Paul Stephenson’s public relations firm, Hanbury Strategy, was given a series of contracts. Campaigners launched a legal action, accusing the Cabinet Office of apparent bias and ...”

“... style of such modern studies of royalty as Anthony Holden’s life of the Prince of Wales and Robert Lacey’s study of the present Queen, Majesty. The point about these books is that they are rather jolly. They may not tell you anything earth-shaking that you did not know before, since their main message is that the ...”

“... on headphones as you walk around) has echoes of Untrue Island, a libretto from 2012 written by Robert Macfarlane at the request of the National Trust. Here is Macfarlane:Listen. Listen now. Listen again to the sounds of this slow-flowing shingle river. Listen to the voices of this untrue island. Listen to the Ness: it speaks gull, it speaks wave, it speaks ...”

“... two decades, and the retreat from avant-garde adventures (he had experimented with Pointillism), may have been a result. When he returned to painting in the last decades of his life he reverted to the Impressionism of his youth. Adjacent rooms that contain the Ashmolean’s collection of Impressionists, Post-Impressionists, Sickerts and Camden Town ...”

“... shop-shelves, montages of violent action from Cuban history and the Spanish Civil War (including Robert Capa’s famous photo of a dying soldier). The base at Guantánamo Bay opens, or rather encloses itself. Sergio is confused. ‘Everything is the same,’ he says, looking around him. And then: ‘I have changed, and the city has changed.’ He quotes a ...”

“... Exposition Universelle, he expressed enthusiasm for British painting – for David Wilkie, Charles Robert Leslie and Francis Grant – and noted that the archaisms of the Pre-Raphaelites (the ‘école sèche’) had not inhibited their response to life and sentiment: he cited the Order of Release by Millais as something beyond the power of ‘nos ...”

“... organisation. He was reported to the Solicitors Regulation Authority by the Conservative MP Robert Jenrick and the Campaign against Antisemitism, and is currently under investigation, despite the law making provision for such an application.On his return from Ireland, he was asked about Hamas but claimed client confidentiality. After his release, Ansari ...”

“... had ‘wittingly’ spied on Americans – a lie for which he has never been held to account. In May 2017, he told NBC’s Chuck Todd that the Russians were highly likely to have colluded with Trump’s campaign because they are ‘almost genetically driven to co-opt, penetrate, gain favour, whatever, which is a typical Russian technique’. The current ...”