Word: descends
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...captivating the susceptible Lady Charlotte, the earl's young daughter. Follett makes good use of a taut if predictable double subplot to forward Feliks' machinations and throw Cabinets, kings and boudoirs into turmoil. The denouement, in which all the major characters and half the British constabulary descend on Walden Hall for the signing of the Anglo-Russian pact, is one of Follett's finest, with a staccato performance by the deceptively cherubic young Winston Churchill, First Lord of the Admiralty. Winston's connivance is echoed in a scene at 10 Downing Street, in which Prime Minister...
...slightly less well as Henry, probably the most challenging character to convey, with by far the most lines--show-stopping or otherwise--and the most emotional peaks. Often his monologue's become so passionate and vigorous that they border on the shrill, shortchanging the "moments of truth" that must descend on a king who has fought to build a near-imperial England and-now sees his grown sons gathered vulture-like to tear it apart. Amid all the yelling his passions provoke, his sons and enemies fall prey occasionally to the same overexcitement. The result is sort of a continuous...
...stunned. Through acts that made no sense, discord would descend once again on a society already weakened by ten years of upheaval over Viet Nam. As I considered what this portended for foreign policy, my heart sank. A nation's capacity to act is based on an intangible amalgam of strength, reputation and commitment to principle. To be harnessed, these qualities require authority backed by public confidence. But if Garment was right, authority inexorably would start draining from the presidency. The dream of a new era of creativity would in all probability evaporate. Even preserving what we had achieved...
...intellectual world. Advancing age has confronted him with a more direct challenge, making him doubt his own usefulness and weakening his will to live. Seated in his study and spreading jam made from turnips on bread made from substances whose origins he dares not guess, Jakob watches night descend and reminisces about a life spent in the struggle to discern the laws underlying the physical world...
Only occasionally will Nabokov descend to biography or history or philosophy. Great art, says he, is sufficient unto itself. Nabokov is interested in words: what they sound like, and how they can be arranged. With words, the artist creates his own imaginary world, a world without values, ideas, or social relevance. For Nabokov, literature is a detective game: The reader tries of solve the word code and enter the imaginary world. Nabokov describes the sensual pleasure he finds in art: a certain tingling feeling in the spinal cord, he says. His cowering pupils are told over and over again that...