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“... wreath of rowan over the bed, the Bible held open by the rusted shears that made the shape of the cross, the bucket of maistir there against the grey folk, the noiseless ones, and a cup of well-water with the gold ring in it for the three mouthfuls that would save me. And saved we were. He was beautiful, our son: blue-eyed, fair; fresh as meltwater. I took ...”

“... In the 1964 film Robin and the Seven Hoods, when someone compares ‘Robbo’ (Frank Sinatra) to Robin Hood, one of the gangsters asks: ‘Who’s Robin Hood?’ And another replies: ‘Well, he was a hood, some Englishman who lived long ago and had an operation going for him in the forest ...”

“... while. 3. The sun is scorching. The plane comes in low, throwing a shadow in the shape of a giant cross, rushing over the ground. A man crouches over something in the field. The shadow reaches him. For a split-second he is in the middle of the cross. I have seen the cross that hangs from ...”

“... you – not even a photograph left of you – the girl who will never touch again the foot of the cross at ...”

“... grief, horror, steps through fire and ice. * The Apache’s long night-vision sees the runners cross-haired: the white men. * The command comes through as ghosts scribble the desert: You’re clear to engage. * Pronghorn, jack-rabbit, coyote, javelina, skunk, mountain lion. * Coyotes running people over the border like sand through the ...”

“... at each hoof to the higher branches, tied to the root by the hands, flagged as his own white cross, the satyr Marsyas hangs. Three stand as honour guard: two apprentices, one butcher. II Let’s have a look at you, then. Bit scrawny for a satyr, all skin and whipcord, is it? Soon find out. So, think you can turn up with your stag-bones and outplay Lord ...”

“... head, dressed in red icicles; Betty Campbell frozen solid in her bath, forehead scored with the cross. I saw Macaulay’s mare with the bleed on the brain going round her field faster and faster till she bolted straight into the stable wall. I saw a fox with a firebrand tied to its tail going over the high cliff, bundled in flames. And off to the west, a ...”

“... The estate at dawn hangs like smoke; the forest drawn in grainy bands of smeared, cross-hatched, illegible trees: a botched photocopy of itself. Swamp maple, sugar maple, red and white oak; first light lifts the pale yellow flare of a beech tree’s papery leaves. Where are you going? What on earth’s the time? A salting of snow, blown across the white table of the lake: thrown leaves scrape and scratch the hard new surface, to be fluked away, in another gust, like cards ...”

“... Dionysus held back at the sprint, to watch: the god of spark and springheel, the god who would cross continents with a single step stood still, and with one breath blew speed into his love’s young body, lifting it over the line. Their race in the red river was the last test, and glowing Ampelos matched it, red for red, his colour rising as he met ...”

“... scepticism by painstaking scholarship). The legends discussed in these books concern Robin Hood, the early history of Glastonbury, and the meaning of the megaliths. Such material poses problems for the professional historian or archaeologist: is it worth the trouble to debunk what are, after all, fairly harmless stories? A society’s legends are ...”

“... their prejudices against each other. All sections of the community enjoyed a good grumble. Robin Cross’s VE Day: Victory in Europe 1945, a commemorative volume which is stronger on domestic than on military matters, notes how queues formed for bread on the very day itself – food shortages were worsening – and records an exchange ‘worthy of ...”

“... house’s poltergeist, shaped like a shuttle Who longs to join the family Sing his bright face, cross-eyed with eagerness His pin-fingers, that seem too small for the job Sing his split nose, that looks so sore O sing his fearless ears, the listener in the wall Let him jump on your head, let him cling there Save him from sticks and stones Sing the rat so ...”

“... Robin Robertson​ is something of a specialist in pain. He usually describes what painful events look like from the outside rather than how they feel from within. It’s often as though sufferers are so entranced by the appearance of what’s happening to them that they can’t actually see how bad it is. There is a fine slight poem from Slow Air (2002) called ‘Break’ in which a woman is washing glasses in the sink and hears a dull click, like a tongue, under the soap suds ...”

“... All Flesh, which came out in 1903, not much more than a decade before the begetting of Christopher Robin, in fact and in fiction. Milne may well have thought that he was destroying for ever that awful old father and son relationship, blowing away the tyranny and obfuscation, showing that age doesn’t matter, that nanny will give them sixpence each and they ...”

“... assigned port like pilgrims, barefoot and bare-headed, clad only in a shift and carrying a wooden cross. At the port, they had to board the first available ship or, if there were none sailing, walk into the sea every day as a token of good faith. This procedure was surprisingly routine. In the 13th and early 14th centuries, William Chester Jordan ...”