(1) In Mary McCarthy’s book The Group, set in the 1930s, the girls made a lot of fuss about their Dutch caps, and when I interviewed her once she said that when she had visited Bernard Berenson in Italy he greeted her with: “Hullo Mary, have you brought your pessary?” Not thinking an elderly gay art critic ought to talk like that, she replied: “No, I haven’t done anything on Pissarro recently…” The pill is the most recent contraceptive, but not the only one, thank goodness.