"I will pass over my flirtation with journalism as a way of making a living, an idea I dropped when I discovered that …"

"Three decades ago, my Midwestern friend, Joe Rosenfield, then in his 80s, received an irritating letter from his loca…"

"It is my ambition to be, as a private individual, abolished and voided from history, leaving it markless, no refuse s…"

"Decency is not news; it is buried in the obituaries — but it is a force stronger than crime."

"I scrolled on down to the obituaries. I usually read the obituaries first as there is always the happy chance that on…"

"In his prime, the young comic walked onto a stage with the confidence of a man who owned it, and by the time he walke…"

"Luciano Pavarotti, who has died aged 71 of pancreatic cancer, grew up in the 1940s listening to the previous golden g…"

"Dido, my deare, alas! is dead, Dead, and lyeth wrapt in lead. O heavie herse!"

"Underneath this sable herse Lyes the subject of all verse."

"On all the line a sudden vengeance waits, And frequent herses shall besiege your gates."