The issue of intimacy coordinators on George RR Martin-related TV series has recently generated headlines. Sean Bean, who played Ned Stark on Game of Thrones, told the Times that he thought they “spoil the spontaneity”, claiming that “the natural way lovers behave would be ruined” if you had “somebody saying: ‘Do this, put your hands there, while you touch his thing.’”

I have no doubt Mrs. Sparkleton will continentalise, and, unless you have lost all regard for Lord Fitzhauton, — you had better not drive him to despair.

These chapters are chapter 24 — the Advocate, the chapter that marks the transition from the landish part of the novel to its sea part, and the famous chapter 32, Cetology.

Its meetings have long ceased, and it is only fair to hope that there be none of the young and gay spirits of Glasgow eager to revive so palpable a gegg as the one we have just recorded, […]