As they marched, the crowds lining the route broke into applause, a sweet and deeply felt spontaneous pattering that was a sort of communal embrace. Welcome home.

Walter Duranty helped to turn the monster Stalin into a world figure and a hero of the leftistWestern intelligentsia by defending the bloodbath of the Soviet Union from its critics in the now famous: "You can't make an omelette without breaking eggs.

The television anchorman Dan Rather turns up in rag-top native drag in Afghanistan, the surrogate of our culture with his camera crew, intrepid as Sir Richard Burton sneaking into Mecca.

Would it be anything like a literary disaster if Gore Vidal were to fall silent? Easy. No. In fact, there is something to be said for the idea.

The Church became both more accessible and less imposing. It threw itself open to risk.

Everywhere you hang your hat is home. Home is the bright cave under the hat.

As American productivity, once the exuberant engine of national wealth, has dipped to an embarrassingly uncompetitive low, Americans have shaken their heads: the country's old work ethic is dead.