Mr. Gerstein was always ready with a slight acceleration, a hairsbreadth rubato or a sudden, subtle shift of tone to keep you on your toes.
It's a book within a hairsbreadth of the landing strip, and its excitement comes from watching one of the greatest careers in modern letters make its final, unsettled preparations to touch down.
Ronald Reagan was the last Republican to carry Wisconsin in a presidential race, in 1984, but George W. Bush came within a hairsbreadth in 2000 and 2004.
Updated, 3 20 p.m. | The knife that had been plunged into Officer Eder Loor's brain came within a hairsbreadth of severing structures that would have crippled or killed him, his neurosurgeon said on Wednesday.
In Britain, the much more gifted Harold Wilson fared no better after he led Labour to a hairsbreadth victory in October 1964.
In 1985, when its sustainability is still unclear and Newhouse comes within a hairsbreadth of pulling the plug, she scores a photo shoot with the Reagans, in the White House.
From humble origins in an Arkansas town called Hope to his hairsbreadth escapes from a long series of scandals culminating in impeachment, Mr. Clinton is an outsized protagonist with commensurate flaws.
The norm consisted of flying bodies, hairsbreadth timing, confrontational games and erotic aggressiveness.
Theatricality is everything: story, stance, hairsbreadth timing.
Although no tantrums are thrown in front of the camera, at moments the collaborators seem only a hairsbreadth away from losing their tempers and giving up on the project.
