"If the prevailing feeling is that Latin and Greek are for toffs, then Boris [Johnson], frankly, is not the man to dis…"

"In north Staffordshire, it is perfectly acceptable, indeed polite social practice, to turn over a plate and inspect t…"

"The classics and class have always been ­uncomfortably linked. In this country's education system, knowledge of the c…"

"The wording chills me slightly, with its suggestion of a regular consignment of Eton scholars as if by a law of nature."

"But "the classics" are so much more than this careless and aggressive chucking around of Latin and Greek tags, as if …"

"The twentieth century had conclusively settled the question of how a society should be organised: liberal democracy, …"

"For James, there was no sense that expanding Tesco’s sales onto the web was what the human race urgently needed. It d…"

"It was insane that you had to pretend to be interested in your job and use these lame phrases like “pinging things ov…"

"James had assumed this would be a task of meticulous detection, of inefficiencies brilliantly uncovered, but there wa…"

"James was twenty- seven and never had a boss again. Until that moment, he and Roland had lived as employees, as if in…"