“The occupation could not be done humanely; there is no humane way to rule people against their will. There are two choices, Beauvoir wrote: accept occupation and all the methods required for its enforcement, ‘or else you reject, not merely certain specific practices, but the greater aim which sanctions them, and for which they are […]
“It all came back to Friedman’s single-minded message: everything went wrong with the New Deal. That’s when so many countries ‘including my own, got off on the wrong track.’ To get governments back on the right track, Friedman, in his first popular book, Capitalism and Freedom, laid out what would become the global free-market rulebook […]
“We stared at each other, with that inner hostility that had been there from the first. After a moment I pushed my chair back and went over to the french windows. I opened the screen and stepped out on to the porch. The night was all around, soft and quiet. The white moonlight was cold […]
“Breeze sighed. ‘Murder and suicide during a drinking spree. The secretary went haywire and shot young Cassidy. I read it in the papers or something. Is that what you want me to say?’ ‘You read it in the papers,’ I said, ‘but it wasn’t so. What’s more you knew it wasn’t so and the D.A. […]
“‘I can see,’ Miss Emily said, ‘that it might look as though you were simply pawns in a game. It can certainly be looked at like that. But think of it. You were lucky pawns. There was a certain climate and now it’s gone. You have to accept that sometimes that’s how things happen in […]
“One big idea behind finding your model was that when you did, you’d glimpse your future. Now I don’t mean anyone really thought that if your model turned out to be, say, a guy working at a railway station, that’s what you’d end up doing too. We all realised it wasn’t that simple. Nevertheless, we […]
“Thinking back now, I can see we were just at that age when we knew a few things about ourselves––about who we were, how we were different from our guardians, from the people outside––but hadn’t yet understood what any of it meant. I’m sure somewhere in your childhood, you too had an experience like ours […]
“‘I know things, and feel things, but the wrong way round. That’s me: all the right answers at none of the right times. I see and can’t understand. I need to adjust my spectrum, pull myself away from the blue end. I could do with a red shift. Galaxies and Rectors have them. Why not […]
“‘You know what Crewe is?’ said Tom. ‘Ultimate reality. That’s why we can’t touch it. Each of these shops is full of every aspect of one part of existence. Woolworth’s is a tool shed; Boots, a bathroom; the British Home Stores, a wardrobe. And we walk through it all, but we can’t clean our teeth, […]
“They moved from shop to shop, resting for as long as they were unnoticed, until they found a crowded Bingo room, so busy and full of smoke that they were able to sit in peace. They watched whole families ranged intent on their illuminated panels, while prams and children rolled about the floor. ‘Parents’ Day […]