Insofar as he teaches culture and tries to model himself on the noble classical prototype, he cares about what is not in common: the nonbarbaric qualities that set the Greeks and Romans apart and above all others.

His extensive mining for apparently statistically significant results made any of his results questionable.

And what would Middleton tell him—the truth? That he believed Chernayev and a great many other Russians saw an arms race on the subcontinent as inevitable. Worse, that China, before that arms race proceeded much further, would invade Kashmir from its own controlled areas in Aksai Chin and the Trans-Karakoram Tract, doing so for the water, contriving some pretext for the offensive such as protecting an otherwise expendable ethnic minority.

Turning out terrific subordinates was not in her wheelhouse. … But she did so, mostly by force of will and with a number of false starts and midcourse corrections, and went on to become an icon in her industry.