Speak and Write like The Economist: Говори и пиши как The Eсonomist

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Michelangelo is a sculptor, a painter and an architect, he sees everything in three dimensions. It is as though he has put the human body on a spindle and is turning it back to front in one view.

More seasoned PR flacks might have done it differently. First, lunch the journalists concerned, ostensibly to discuss some other story. Then, over dessert, casually slip into the conversation the poison that their secret client wanted them to spread. With luck the reporters would follow up on the scuttlebutt without mentioning its source, assuring themselves that they had got the story through their "contacts".

Imagine, further, that every newspaper felt obliged to print such choice items as this: "The Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz, has sent a reply cable of thanks to Crown Prince Sultan bin Abdul Aziz, Deputy Premier, Minister of Defence and Aviation and Inspector-General, thanking the Crown Prince and all personnel of the armed forces for their congratulations to the King on the occasion of Eid al Fitr, marking the end of the holy month of Ramadan, in the cable sent earlier to the King by the Crown Prince.

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It is too easy to pass the test that determines whether a film is sufficiently British to be worthy of state support. Because the criteria include where a film is set and the nationality of its main characters, actors and scriptwriters, film-makers can easily qualify by adding a few minor details, such as shoot-outs in Waterloo station and the assassination in the first few minutes of a British journalist (both features of "The Bourne Ultimatum").

Even these literary touches may be unnecessary: films such as "Dark Knight", a Batman movie set in mythical Gotham City, also qualify for subsidy because chunks are filmed in Britain and they employ local people in important positions.

He had that curious love of green, which in individuals is always the sign of a subtle artistic temperament, and in nations is said to denote a laxity, if not a decadence of morals.

Virtually every day of the year sees another art biennial opening somewhere in the world.

In most German states, after just four years of primary school children are steamed into one of several types of secondary school: clever kids attend Gymnasien, middling ones Realschulen and the slowest learners Hauptschulen, which are supposed top prepare them for trades. Children at the bottom often face low-wage drudgery or the dole.