“... on the number of irritating mother-figures in O’Connor’s fiction who come to grisly ends: Mrs May in ‘Greenleaf’ is gored to death by a bull, while in ‘Everything That Rises Must Converge’ Julian’s mother, an inveterate racist (as Regina seems to have been), gets punched in the face by a black woman and suffers a stroke; Thomas accidentally ...”

“... of them took to including asides addressed to her in the course of their letters to him. Posterity may also blame her for the fact that Lees-Milne either failed to keep or later destroyed his diaries for the middle years of his complicated and often unhappy marriage. His thoughts on the later 1950s and 1960s were lost in a maze of inter and extra-marital ...”

“... Mbeki was only an extreme example of a general tendency: the incoming African political elite may have espoused universal values and human rights, but the racial prejudice of this aspirant national bourgeoisie was deeply ingrained: they were geared up to confront a white world which they quietly believed was not only superior but infinitely cunning. For ...”

“... the Middle East, thousands of unarmed protesters marched on Israel’s borders on Nakba Day, 15 May, the annual commemoration of the flight and expulsion of three-quarters of a million Palestinians from their lands and homes in the 1948 war. In the West Bank itself, new tactics were being used. Late in the same year, a group of young Palestinian activists ...”

“... alienating Muslims, especially young people and students,’ and ‘counter-terrorism measures may themselves feed and sustain terrorism.’ MI5 rejected the conveyor belt theory in 2008, in a report leaked to the Guardian. In 2010, the incoming coalition cabinet received a briefing (leaked to the Sunday Telegraph) that warned them not ‘to regard ...”

“... that Tracey is tied to the requirements of bedtime, shared custody and lunch money in a way she may never be. Time swings, advantage changes hands, but comparison, as structuring force and engine of meaning, remains. As Swing Time reached its climax, it began to remind me of the middle section of Smith’s last novel, NW, the part presented in numbered ...”

“... really be accused of having failed to adopt an equivalent role in Europe? In my view, what Germany may justifiably be criticised for is its reckless identification of a common currency with ‘the European project’. There, of course, the governments of France and the Mediterranean countries are to blame as well, as they still hope to use the hard euro as an ...”

“... harmonic prologue. His correspondence with his father was now painfully businesslike. In May 1787 Leopold died, and Mozart allowed his relationship with Nannerl to drift. The only life that interested him was Vienna and Constanze – and the world of secret codes and rituals of his local masonic lodge, for which he wrote several works (all of them ...”

“... Belonging – and noticing a similarity between the titles of the first and last chapters, may well conclude that the book’s argument runs something like this: wherever in the world the Jews have lived, they have yearned to belong to that place as Jews. But in many of these places, non-Jewish society brutally rejected the possibility of Jewish ...”

“... that a good man, through no fault of his own, but by way of received wisdom and immemorial faith, may have lived an important part of/his life warped in error and foolishness’. Luckily the sonar readings and the traditional method – heading straight out from the bottom of Kerrigan’s land, bringing the spire of the Protestant church in the north out with ...”

“... is officially equal to one US dollar but the actual black-market rate is around 3.6 to 1, and may have changed by the time this goes to press. In October, for a single week, inflation rocketed and people with bond cash rushed to spend it before it became worthless: there were runs on alcohol in the supermarkets, and shoppers were limited to a single can ...”

“... certainly false). He was also accused of privately parodying the Eleusinian Mysteries and this may well have been true: naughty theatricality was central to his character. The two incidents, however, were cleverly mingled and made the subject of a criminal charge. Despite Alcibiades’ requests for a quick hearing, when the fleet set out with magnificent ...”

“... the investigation last? When can I leave for Kazakhstan? I explain to Ivan that the investigation may be complex and that we will need to follow all the relevant protocols. ‘Yes, yes, yes.’ He stares down at his phone, scrolling for emails and messages. Sergei’s PA has booked me into a hotel that has only recently opened. She tells me it will be good ...”

“... God himself compromised by being the creator of a sinful creature?) So praise, for example, may now be born of pride, which God opposes; and even though God must be worthy of the highest praise – no one and nothing could be more worthy – it is not clear that man, let alone this particular man, is up to the task (there is a difference between seeking ...”

“... example:French Marxists are still French in their intellectual style. Ideologically, they may have a lot in common with communist Chinese or communist North Koreans. But in style of reasoning and in the idiom of his thought, a French Marxist has more in common with a French liberal than with fellow communists in China and Korea. And that is why a ...”