A 19th-century critic once said "Pushkin is our everything", a phrase still popular in Russian schools ("We repeat it as if hypnotised," says Ksenia Papazova of Glagoslav books, which publishes Russian works in translation).
But still she falls, helplessly, as if hypnotised, a motion she celebrates in Nothing Else to Do with such perfumed languor that it's hard not to fall in love back.
Don't get me wrong, the falls themselves are, of course, truly spectacular, and once I had conquered my inexplicable desire to hurl myself over the railings, I stood watching the cascade for ages, as if hypnotised.
I'm not a great fan of grown men playing Shakespeare's women, but Samuel Barnett's Queen Elizabeth confronts Richard with steely ferocity before kissing him passionately as if hypnotised by his chutzpah.
Marsh c Smith b Philander 148 (Australia: 348-7) Good-ish ball from Philander, nipping slightly off the seam as it does, but strange decision making from Marsh, who follows the ball as if hypnotised and offers some training ground catching practice to first slip.
As each small movement is described, we watch as if hypnotised – and it feels as though we are watching over the man's shoulder, so close we can hear him breathing: "He clipped the line that was attached to the hook to the feather trace and moved the weight so it was linked from the baited hook.
