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“... problem with the voice of the book is its familiarity – its provenance, almost. The pastiche of Martin Amis is undisguised and apparently fearless. Here are the tropes in full, right down to the patented CST (Cadenced Synonym Triptych): ‘a troupe, a tiller, a greenham’ (of women keeping vigil outside a hospital). Here are the double-take paradoxes of ...”

“... This book was the subject of a particularly vitriolic review in the Sunday Tribune by one Martin Mansergh. Mansergh’s father, Nicholas, is the distinguished Cambridge historian, and Mansergh fils (a Protestant) is Head of Research in the opposition Fianna Fail party. ‘Research’ is Fianna Fail code for ‘Northern Ireland’, and English readers ...”

“... Peter Ackroyd’s new novel is partly a narrative, partly a series of rhapsodies and meditations on the nature of English culture, written in the styles of various great authors. It is an important and a depressing book, its importance more or less in direct proportion to the depth of the gloom it sheds. With luck we may one day look back on it as the last ‘English’ novel ...”

“... On 15 February 1902, James Joyce, aged 20, read a paper on James Clarence Mangan to the Literary and Historical Society of what is now University College, Dublin. It was a brash performance. Joyce spoke as if he were introducing an unknown poet, and chose to ignore the facts that there were several collections of Mangan’s poems at large and that his life and work had been extensively written about ...”

“... Whether by happy accident or design, the publication of Peter Jackson’s George Scharf’s London coincided with the opening of a notable exhibition at the Museum of London called simply ‘Londoners’. Although Scharf’s oeuvre is most readily classified as topographical art, his sketches are as descriptive of the everyday Londoners who went about their lawful pursuits in the decades between 1820 and 1850 as they are of sides of the emerging metropolis which down to that time were largely neglected by the best-known London iconographers ...”

“... For 27 years Michael Wharton has written the ‘Peter Simple’ column in the Daily Telegraph. He was only 43 when he secured this good, steady job and now he has published an autobiographical account of his 43 apprentice years – dissident, drifting, bohemian years, marked by a lack of will-power, what the Greeks called aboulia ...”

“... a pity that James, who can talk with such trenchancy and sense about everything from Mandelstam to Martin Amis, makes such a fool of himself (and of us) when he touches on the literature of his birthplace. His recent overview of Australian poetry in the Times Literary Supplement shows him at his worst – uninformed and wallowing. Even when he affects to ...”

“... Though she was lucky to get such a big advance for her apprentice manuscript – half a dozen of Martin Amis – she set about learning the tricks of the trade from those who knew better, and is still learning. This, her second book, shorter and sharper than her first, is generally a better read. Compared with The Downing Street Years, it has the more ...”

“... is now a professor; the rise of the serious study of historiography; and the set of changes which Martin Jay has called ‘the linguistic turn’ in historical method – the shift not simply towards a greater preoccupation with language, but also towards ‘literature’ (in its broadest sense), and so towards culture. The ‘linguistic turn’ was not ...”

“... most of which would have been to pay for continuous care. Ledwidge also tells the story of ‘Peter’, who served with him in the same reservist unit. A talented linguist, physically fit and a promising commander, he was seen as an ideal candidate for special forces, but was seriously injured in a bomb attack in 2006. The MoD told him, wrongly, that as a ...”

“... is a different matter. Uncollected in the Faber anthology is a moment in Michael Wharton’s ‘Peter Simple’ memoir when one of the more heroic Fleet Street pub-performers kept a long-postponed appointment with his doctor. After tapping and humming away, the quack inquired mildly; ‘D’you drink at all?’ Well-primed for the routine, and knowing that ...”

“... 22 paintings for the Mercedarians, including two of his most famous works, the Apparition of St Peter to St Peter Nolasco (now at the Prado) and the Martyrdom of St Serapion (now at the Wadsworth Atheneum in Connecticut).As Jonathan Brown puts it in the catalogue that accompanied the touring exhibition, Zurbarán was ...”

“... out yourselves from the Curzon and other cinemas, where it is now showing in a restored print. Martin Scorsese, a great admirer of the film, says it is about the ‘madness of making movies’, a view not entirely at odds with all the disgust, just more interested in comparative madness. The film itself looks alternately stiff and stylish. People speak ...”

“... in the same way that the screenplay for John Huston’s The Bible is by Christopher Fry, or for Martin Scorsese’s The Last Temptation of Christ by Paul Schrader. Pasolini hasn’t really written this movie, he has made excerpts from the gospel and filmed them, either as images in the manner we have just looked at, or with images, in the style of much of ...”

“... Doctor’s last four incarnations (in reverse order: Paul McGann, Sylvester McCoy, Colin Baker, Peter Davison), though obviously no match for Tom Baker – at the controls of a souped-up Tardis. As I write, he’s at the mercy of a gang of obese aliens who’ve long been lurking behind the scenes at Downing St, and for complicated reasons have just staged ...”