“... Samuel Palmer, Goya, a miniature of the bewitching Cornelia Boinville (disturbingly like Lady Caroline Lamb), a sketch-plan by Edward Williams of the interior of the Don Juan boat, showing folding tables, lockers, and ‘Shilo’s library’ skilfully fitted round the bulkhead. Ah, dreams of ...”

“... is inevitably, but still unfortunately, scattered. The liveliest figure is Eurydike, a would-be Lady Macbeth 15 years old, who marries Alexander’s idiot brother and propels him upwards through a political career, leading ever larger mutinies in the armies; the other contenders are amazed, discomfited, she more than keeps them busy. But they are the ...”

“... evenings at the shop where Mikage’s grandmother had often bought flowers; he had adored the old lady, and now invites Mikage to come and live for as long as she wants to in his own home. The delicate relationship between the two, which never quite defines itself, is described, day by day, with a kind of touching persistence, as though the narrator’s life ...”

“... eyed me in astonishment and began to laugh: “Can you mountain-climb? An elegant little lady like you shouldn’t be traipsing around mountains.’ ” Poor sap, he isn’t to know what he’s up against. Within another page and a half Leni has tracked down and charmed Dr Fanck. A few mornings later she receives a parcel. Inside is a ...”

“... met such a Gorgon ... I don’t really know what a Gorgon is like, but I am quite sure that Lady Bracknell is one’). 5. Preposterous rural churchmen are on hand to supply authenticity (‘My sermon on the meaning of manna in the wilderness can be adapted to almost any occasion’). 6. Ridiculous matrimonial entanglements are resolved, by absurd ...”

“... of recent years, the unlawful funding of the Pergau Dam in Malaysia, involved not him but Lady Thatcher and the saintly Douglas Hurd. It is also said that Michael Howard has demeaned his high office by using legislation to embarrass the Opposition. Much is made in this regard of such monstrosities as the Criminal Justice and Public Order Bill and the ...”

“... most are real: Lord Melchett (Morgan’s 19-year-old buddy), Lord Astor and his bride, Lord and Lady Duff Gordon, a Frick, a Vanderbilt, Mr and Mrs Straus who own Macy’s, and also Thomas Andrews, the architect of the Titanic, and Bruce Ismay, a White Star official. Real or fictional, they divide roughly into a group of young bloods and flappers, on the ...”

“... which sank into the sod like park-keepers’ spikes. The women were contenders in the Best-Dressed Lady competition (‘kindly sponsored by Brian de Staic’) and/or the Most Elegant Mother & Daughter event. I kept an unofficial book on the Best-Dressed Man handicap: my nap was a character in a five-gallon hat and red neckerchief. I had him in a double with a ...”

“... in white. The pink stone steps of somebody’s pink stucco house, the oranges we ate with some lady.’ Therapy, like artistry, works best when its effects are everywhere present and nowhere visible; the lineaments of Hornbacher’s hours on the couch are a little too obvious. And the therapeutic process seems far from complete, which makes Wasted less ...”

“... faced with the consequences. The feigning continued. ‘I do not genuinely think the Honourable Lady is accusing either the prime minister of this country or, indeed, the home secretary of racism,’ Atkins said. ‘That would be a truly extraordinary allegation to make.’ Responding to a CEO who said his company wouldn’t advertise on GB News until it ...”

“... month. The sun was too high in the sky for most of the wild creatures favoured by Artemis, the lady of wild things, potnia theron; all the rabbits and mice were hiding in the undergrowth. I went to Brauron with the poet Alicia Stallings, who recently translated the Batrachomyomachia, or The Battle between the Frogs and the Mice, an ancient mock-epic that ...”

“... dish and its contents were an invocation to Yemaja, the sea goddess, to invoke her help with the lady in the photo’s health problems. I agreed to replace the casserole and photo in the sea. I didn’t mention the fruit floating in the water but many pages I Googled cite this as a possible sacrifice to the goddess and it is perfectly OK for passers-by to ...”

“... an abrasive forensics specialist in the original series, and Catherine Coulson, aka the Log Lady. That wasn’t the only way in which Lynch seemed more self-referential and ruminative than before, or to be addressing the world beyond the fantasy. History had, in some ways, caught up with Twin Peaks: Jerry Horne was now in the legal weed business, Dr ...”

“... who wrote a dramatic account of the storm in a 3000-word letter to an unidentified ‘excellent lady’ in London, which is vividly echoed in the first scene of The Tempest. It was the survivors of that shipwreck that later became the first colonists to lay claim to Bermuda for the British. ‘It did strike me as a woeful exploitation of the primeval ...”

“... a brilliantly eccentric woman.’ ‘Oh, she was,’ Catherine said. ‘A terrifying, small Tory lady with a tight mouth. She always wore a brooch and a grey suit and had very bright eyes. Horrible to the men – “Shut up Christopher, you’re here to get the tea, not to talk!” – but very generous and nice to me. She ran the Talks department at Lime ...”