To the Hermitage Recent Acquisitions an astute young policeman with

an astute young policeman with twin passions for food and poetry

But the truth can be a dangerous thing

Hollyoaks and Grange Hill

Damned silly nonsense all this medium business

To the Hermitage Recent Acquisitions an astute young policeman withTo the Hermitage tells two stories. The first is of the narrator, a novelist, on a trip to Stockholm and Russia for an academic seminar called the Diderot Project. The second takes place two hundred years earlier and recreates the journey the French philosopher Denis Diderot made to Russia at the invitation of Catherine the Great, a woman whose influence could change the path of history . . . Malcolm Bradburys last novel is rich with his satirical