Passions Past and Present
by Roy Strong
Pimlico £12.99, pp193

In a way, this collection of essays by Sir Roy Strong defies criticism. On the one hand, here is a man who has devoted a considerable amount of his life to the public good (directing and reforming both the National Portrait Gallery and the V&A), who clawed his way up into the establishment from working-class roots and a man whose writing is, ostensibly, sweetly inoffensive, featuring, as it does so often, things like his garden or much-loved paintings. He is a man who is, probably, quite likable.

But on the other hand, the rest of the book is packed with self-aggrandising references to lunch with the Queen Mother, weekends with a Poet Laureate or strangers who 'pluck up the courage to say, "Thank you for all the pleasure you've given me."' It's littered with nauseating descriptions of Princess Diana ('fairy princess, fieldworker, fashion model, loving mother, international playgirl and hospital visitor').

And why on earth would anyone want to write an essay entitled 'Herefordshire, the Forgotten County'? To those of us not enthralled by the machinations of the establishment or why 'Our England Is a Garden', there is little of interest here.