His funeral was a private affair attended by some 50 family and close friends.

ECONOMIST: Henri Cartier-Bresson

In vain the ministry argued that this was a private affair.

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Sure, there is criticism and, less frequently, praise, but learning ballet is a surprisingly private affair.

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But it certainly wasn't a private family affair either.

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"We don't want lavish, pompous weddings, much better to have a private and dignified affair, " he said.

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Though, personally, I prefer to make "SimCity" a simple, private affair.

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That sometimes makes collaboration with the private sector, particularly drug companies, a fraught affair.

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The captain is Ryan Giggs, a Welshman who tried and failed to keep private reports of an extra-marital affair.

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Ministers have tried to dismiss the affair as a distraction, arguing that it concerns Mr Mitterrand's private life and not his capacity to carry out his job promoting French culture.

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The linchpin of the action is Jiang Cheng, a young travel agent and, in his spare time, a female impersonator, who is having an affair with Wang Ping, a college student and a married man whose wife hires a private eye to follow him.

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Through a close reading of a mass of private documents, Ms Harris subtly draws the complex, and contradictory, human behaviour behind the public affair.

ECONOMIST: The Dreyfus affair