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“... back, if only as chat fodder in the salons. In 1940, their libel case was for several months, says Philip Ziegler, ‘the chief pleasure of literary London’. Most sensible people believed that the lawsuit should never have been brought. Desmond MacCarthy, asked to appear as a pro-Sitwell witness, responded with a telegram: ‘Even fools have right to say ...”

“... Life and Legend (until 22 June). The problem for the exhibition’s organisers – and for Philip Parker, whose book The Northmen’s Fury seems designed to tie in with it – is that we know too much about Vikings already. We know what they looked like: big, hairy, threatening, wearing horned helmets as like as not. We know what they did: rape and ...”

“... followed his ‘The Married Son’ (Charles Edward), they were not simply ignored but rudely cut short by the strong-arm trenchancy of Elizabeth Stuart Phelps, who seems to have identified herself with her bossy character and resented the hostility of the other members of the family. ‘I shall defend Maria from the aspersions of being “a ...”

“... Tryphena Sparks, Trollope and Kate Field, James and his obscure hurt. So when Monica Jones follows Philip Larkin’ s request by burning his diaries do we feel resentment because the destruction will set an eternal gap between reader and poem? Or is it something lower – frustration at not having served up on some not too distant Sunday the ‘secret ...”

“... often taken parodic form (the soup cans of Andy Warhol, the deliberate kitsch of architects like Philip Venturi, author of the feisty manifesto Learning from Las Vegas) is now itself parodied in Gilbert Adair’s funny and accomplished second novel. The narrator of Love and Death on Long Island is the Hampstead-inhabiting author of four novels more popular ...”

“... reputation in America, and I suspect that none is read with the closeness and loyalty which Philip Larkin recently inspired. Of that generation of younger poets represented by Andrew Motion, only James Fenton is a known quantity in America, and his renown probably stems less from his poems, meritorious as the best of those may be, than from his ...”

“... bitterness it was extremely well concealed. History, however, is made by historians and, in the short run at any rate, cannot be relied upon to provide totally objective judgments. Field-Marshal Montgomery, despite his low opinion of academics, was well aware that the muse can be overpowered and seduced. In his Memoirs and self-adulatory campaign ...”

“... appetites, or their cultural epiphenomena? Athenian society looks oddly familiar: barmen gave short measure, tarts knitted between clients, fishmongers threw water on yesterday’s stock. Yet how can you enter into a culture which had no weekends and no refrigerators? Moreover, attitude needs data to work on, and data are hard to come by. Something can be ...”

“... arty B-movies, or B art-movies, at the same time that Lethem was writing Amnesia Moon, a homage to Philip K. Dick, and Gun, with Occasional Music, a homage to Chandler and Hammett; graffiti and other outsider art started appearing in museums and auction houses; and DJ-worship replaced the mid-century cult of the conductor. It’s possible, in other words, to ...”

“... of the house was enchanting down even to the shape of the seat-backs. But the stern sounds of Philip II’s monologue from Verdi’s Don Carlos brought back the reality of the situation. ‘She has never loved me,’ Philip sings of his wife Elisabeth de Valois. So might Russia sing of Armenia. Russia helped Armenia ...”

“... Morris had thrown ‘a deal of cold water’ on the idea: for him, by that time, nothing would do short of revolution. But undoubtedly Ashbee had shown the Lamp of Sacrifice. He could perfectly well have salved his conscience in his high-minded practice as an architect. Instead of this, he set out with his men for the Promised Land. His mission was not so ...”

“... keenness’ – and the right clothes for all occasions. ‘Today she wore a dark green suit and a Philip Treacy hat that was a minuscule square of black velvet topped with a few wisps of what might be spun sugar.’ ‘She was wearing the grey silk kimono that some Japanese bigwig presented to her when she visited Kyoto as a UN Special Ambassador for ...”

“... a vivid recollection of Herman Roth’s near-fatal attack of peritonitis in late October 1944 when Philip was ten. He was saved by sulfa powder, newly developed during the early years of the war to treat battle-front wounds. But it was a very close thing and the revealed mortality of his father during the height of his Oedipal conflict affected Roth ...”

“... AT–T Building in New York) gave plausibility to the promotional prose. AT–T was the work of Philip Johnson, the friend of Andy Warhol, and so the publicity came with a background story ready to hand. The Post-Modern would be the art-historical movement that went beyond art by stopping short of art. Where Modernism was ...”

“... master plan. Born in 1874, Maugham lived to be almost 92 and published 20 novels, eight short story collections, five travel books, nine books of essays and three memoirs. In addition, he wrote 29 plays and translated three more from Italian and French. Ashenden says that ‘posterity makes its choice not from among the unknown writers of a ...”