The most controversial and newsworthy plays of British theatre are a rash of rude, vicious and provocative pieces by a brat pack of twentysomethings whose debuts startled critics and audiences with their heady mix of sex, violence and street-poetry.

Aleks Sierz, Faber & Faber, 5 March 2001

Is New Labour's 'new politics for a new Britain' just rhetoric, just empty words?

Norman Fairclough, Routledge, 6 March 2000

Instead of championing a radical idea of a new society, the left has reconciled itself to society as it is

Russell Jacoby, Basic Books, 1999

Like the Truth Commission itself, Krog's Country of My Skull gives central prominence to the power of the testimony of the victims, combining the reportage skills of the journalist with the poet's ability to let previously unheard voices emerge with their stories.

Antjie Krog , Vintage, 4 November 1999

Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, published between 1776 and 1788, is the undisputed masterpiece of English historical writing which can only perish with the language itself.

The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Wordsworth, 19 September 1998