Kinton Ford at n+1:
GEORGE STEINER IS A CHARMING but monstrous narcissist. In November 2001, I spent an amazing evening with him and the Celebrated Poet at the Professor of Poetry’s house. Things got started when another Professor, the Poet, and an Artist (the Poet’s spouse), complained laughingly about the xerox machine in the University English Department. This led to an interesting and moving story of Steiner’s about his Czech students copying out Middlemarch by hand since access to copying was extremely difficult in Prague: the Czech xerox machines were controlled by the state, lest any samizdat activities got going.
more here.