The Dons: Mentors, Eccentrics and Geniuses

A wonderfully engaging and entertaining history of the great dons of the last two hundred years, by one of our leading historians of ideas.Rich in anecdote, and displaying all the author’s customary mastery of his subject, The Dons is Noel Annan at his erudite, encyclopedic and entertaining best.The book is a kaleidoscope of wonderful vignettes illustrating the brilliance and eccentricities of some of the greatest figures of British university life. Here is Buckland dropping to his knees to lick the supposed patch of martyr’s blood in an Italian cathedral and remarking, ‘I can tell you what it is; it’s bat’s urine.’ Or the granitic Master of Balliol, A.D. Lindsay, whose r…