Like many of you, I have an unhealthy obsession with House of Cards, mostly because I think Claire Underwood is perfect, and wish I could be 8% like her. My parents informed me they were massive fans of the British edition, which ran for four episodes on the BBC in 1990, and, because I'm inclined to assume that British versions of things will be classier than American versions, I always imagined it was a lot…

Seeing Seamus Heaney is a bit like seeing someone who should be dead, in that it’s only by the grace of God you’re alive at the same time as him. The stroke he had in 2006 nearly killed him, and now his hands flutter gently when he holds a book. I would say he’s less substantial than he was but the tremble gives him a slightly ethereal quality: not fragile, but somehow less earthbound. I…