One of the worst plights of the twentieth century has been to be Russian - at any point

One of the worst plights of the twentieth century has been to be Russian - at any point. They fought in the Great War with the other Allies. Then came the Revolution. Then the Civil War. Then the Red Terror. Then the Second World War. And beyond all this there was Stalin: Siberia lay in wait, and the gulags. Those of us who have spent most of our life in a politically stable country in peacetime can only look back in horror. And in ignorance. This is a dimension of distress that is barely conceivable.

P. Lively, A House unlocked (2001), 87

Two powerful forces of enlightenment - television and general mobility

Peering back into the 1940s, it is difficult to realize how deeply polarized society was then - even for one who was around at the time and exposed to its stringent rules and assumptions. There is a fair amount of mutual ignorance today between city and country, but it is tempered by two powerful forces of enlightenment - television and general mobility. The sight, sound and function of the countryside are familiar to all, if only through the windows of a car or as the backdrop to some news item or rural drama series.

P. Lively, A House unlocked (2001), 36

Exmoor itself was a relatively recent discovery

Exmoor itself was a relatively recent discovery, opened up by the railway in much the same way as the Rocky Mountains or the Sierra Nevada. People had not realized it was there - except of course those who had been living and working in those parts for centuries. but from the moment Isambard Kingdom Brunel's line snaked west towards the toe of the country and in due course threw out tentacles to net the whole of the peninsula, nothing would ever be the same again. 

P. Lively, A House unlocked (2001), 9

The only surprise about his two centuries on a farewell first-class trip to Lord's was that he needed a bridge to cross the river

It was Sangakkara, though, who spectators came to watch, and the authority and precision of his strokeplay were much admired, not least by fellow players. The only surprise about his two centuries on a farewell first-class trip to Lord's was that he needed a bridge to cross the river.

R. Spiller, 'Surrey', L. Booth (ed.), Wisden Cricketers' Almanack (2018), 587

The system that specialised in preventing you

'In Erfurt, I became radicalised against the system. The system that specialised in preventing you. Preventing you full stop.'

I had felt the same at sixteen, in the same system. I'd felt old before I was young. In a liberal democracy, Felix would have been a run-of-the-mill anarchist, a regular angry young man, and his rebellion would have run its course. But not in East Germany in 1971.

K. Kassabova, Border (2017), 92

Never mind 2015: this could have been 1895

You might describe it as a series of its time - cricket for the attention-deprived, 140-character age. And yet there was something queerly retro about it all. Three-day tests? Pitifully low totals? England v Australia playing each other every few months to the exclusion of almost anything else? Never mind 2015: this could have been 1895.

J. Liew, 'England v Australia in 2015', L. Booth (ed.), Wisden Cricketers' Almanack (2016), 334

This was a duty, an obligation, the right thing to do.

Perhaps nothing summed him up better than the last of the several pieces he wrote for Wisden: a tribute to his friend and hero Keith Miller in 2005. the editor muttered apologetically about the feebleness of the fee.  No, he said, he didn't want a fee. This was a duty, an obligation, the right thing to do.

'Obituaries: Benaud, Richard', L. Booth (ed.), Wisden Cricketers' Almanack (2016), 195

I am a sucker for these moments. For a variety of reasons, there are lots in Wisden 2016. I liked this one best.