Confronted by this lavishly endorsed book — ‘compelling’ (David Lodge), ‘gripping’(John le Carré),‘thrilling’ (Jonathan Freedland) — I felt depressed. Two weeks ago, the New York Times’s savvy London correspondent accused the British of being obsessed with the Nazis. This might appear a case of pots and kettles: not for nothing did America’s widely watched History
One of the best permanent shows in London is the Science Museum’s collection of electrical and magnetic instruments commissioned by George III. Here, gathered in one room, you can see orreries, Leyden jars, air pumps and – my favourite – electrostatic spangles flickering like lightning in the glass pillars of a temple intended to stand
EDITH WHARTON’S FRENCH RIVIERAby Philippe Collas and Eric VilledaryFlammarion, £22.50, pp. 149, ISBN 2080107224 London, even in normal years, is rained on for 150 days to Nice’s 60; it receives a paltry 1,500 hours of sunlight in comparison to Nice’s enviable 2,700. And yet, despite the town’s proud boast of having 1,000 hotels and 3,000