Quotes by British Authors - Page 506

Very few politicians, who have chosen a political career, can fulfill the aspirations and survive the strains of an elevated office that in a monarchy was filled so randomly. Each tsar had to be simultaneously dictator and supreme general, high priest and Little Father. They required all the qualities listed by the sociologist Max Weber: the personal gift of grace, the virtue of legality, and "the authority of the eternal yesterday.
Simon Sebag Montefiore
Nor was her love for Udayan recognizable or intact. Anger was always mounted to it, zigzagging through her like some helplessly mating pair of insects. Anger at him for dying when he might have lived. For bringing her happiness, and then taking it away. For trusting her, only to betray her. For believing in sacrifice, only to be so selfish in the end.
Jhumpa Lahiri
[T]he success of every novel -- if it's a novel of action -- depends on the high spots. The thing to do is to say to yourself, "What are my big scenes?" and then get every drop of juice out of them.", Issue 64, Winter 1975)
P.G. Wodehouse
I am sorry for those who have never had the experience of seeing the victory of a national liberation movement, and I feel cold contempt for those who jeer at it.
Christopher Hitchens
Thoughts race, as if, in a mind devoid of memory, each idea has too much space to grow and move, to collide with others in a shower of sparks before spinning off into its own distance.
S.J. Watson
The screech of tyres, an almighty bang and a car exploded through the playground wall like a high-velocity bullet through a watermelon.
Kev Heritage
There is always more goodness in the world than there appears to be because goodness is of its very nature modest and retiring.
Evelyn Beatrice Hall
Children can be disgusting, and often they can develop extraordinary talents, but I’m yet to meet any child who can stimulate his carotid arteries inside his ribcage.
Ben Goldacre
Imagine that every man’s mind is an island, surrounded by ocean. Each seems isolated, yet in reality all are linked by the bedrock from which they spring. If the ocean were to vanish, that would be the end of the islands. They would all be part of one continent, but the individuality would have gone
Arthur C. Clarke
Authors need readers and not followers. Authors need review and not Likes!
Lily Amis
Sometimes nature is even crueller than politics.
Clive Barker
Even if the powers destroy us," he said, "who are we, to condemn them? As well might a fleeting word judge the speaker that forms it. Perhaps they use us for their own high ends, use our strength and our weakness, our joy and our pain, in some theme inconceivable to us, and excellent." But I protested, "What theme could justify such waste, such futility? And how can we help judging; and how otherwise can we judge than by the light of our own hearts, by which we judge ourselves? It would be base to praise the Star Maker, knowing that he was too insensitive to care about the fate of his worlds." Bvalltu was silent in his mind for a moment. Then he looked up, searching among the smoke-clouds for a daytime star. And then he said to me in his mind, "If he saved all the worlds, but tormented just one man, would you forgive him? Or if he was a little harsh only to one stupid child? What has our pain to do with it, or our failure? Star Maker! It is a good word, though we can have no notion of its meaning. Oh, Star Maker, even if you destroy me, I must praise you. Even if you torture my dearest. Even if you torment and waste all your lovely worlds, the little figments of your imagination, yet I must praise you. For if you do so, it must be right. In me it would be wrong, but in you it must be right.
Olaf Stapledon
If anything she was a shade too plump, but she knew the ninety-seven ways of making love that the Hindus are supposed to set much store by―though mind you, it is all nonsense, for the seventy-fourth position turns out to be the same as the seventy-third, but with your fingers crossed.
George MacDonald Fraser
What connexion can there be, between the place in Lincolnshire, the house in town, the Mercury in powder, and the whereabout of Jo the outlaw with the broom, who had that distant ray of light upon him when he swept the churchyard-step? What connexion can there have been between many people in the innumerable histories of this world, who, from opposite sides of great gulfs, have, nevertheless, been very curiously brought together!
Charles Dickens
The test of a progressive policy is not private but public, not just rising income and consumption for individuals, but widening the opportunities and what Amartya Sen calls the 'capabilities' of all through collective action. But that means, it must mean, public non-profit initiative, even if only in redistributing private accumulation. Public decisions aimed at collective social improvement from which all human lives should gain. That is the basis of progressive policy—not maximising economic growth and personal incomes. Nowhere will this be more important than in tackling the greatest problem facing us this century, the environmental crisis. Whatever ideological logo we choose for it, it will mean a major shift away from the free market and towards public action, a bigger shift than the British government has yet envisaged. And, given the acuteness of the economic crisis, probably a fairly rapid shift. Time is not on our side.
Eric Hobsbawm
It is said that men condemned to death are subject to sudden moments of elation; as if, like moths in the fire, their destruction were coincidental with attainment.
John le Carré
It seemed unfair that despite the fact he could not use them, or feel them, his extremities should cause him so much discomfort.
Jojo Moyes
I can never see why people should be jealous. After all, youth isn't a matter of privilege, we all get the same share of it. Some people may be born at an easier time or be richer or more privileged than others, but that hasn't anything to do with being young
P.D. James
Water shrinks wool, urgency shrinks time.Shrinkage may be an advantage or the reverse, according to expectation.
Idries Shah
When you’ve tried everything and failed, try everything else and succeed
Benny Bellamacina
They sounded really professional because they had two Vox AC 30 amplifiers. I also had an AC 30, so when you looked at it, three AC 30s, three Fenders - bloody hell, it must be a great band!
Tony Iommi
[Pope] Clement waved his hands in irritation as if to dismiss the very idea. "The world is crumbling into ruin. Armies are marching. Men and women are dying everywhere, in huge numbers. Fields are abandoned and towns deserted. The wrath of the Lord is upon us and He may be intending to destroy the whole of creation. People are without leaders and direction. They want to be given a reason for this, so they can be reassured, so they will return to their prayers and their obiediences. All this is going on, and you are concerned about the safety of two Jews?
Iain Pears
I see the truth in people because they can see the truth in me.
Anthony T.Hincks
Many religions now come before us with ingratiating smirks and outspread hands, like an unctuous merchant in a bazaar. They offer consolation and solidarity and uplift, competing as they do in a marketplace. But we have a right to remember how barbarically they behaved when they were strong and were making an offer that people could not refuse.
Christopher Hitchens
The more highly public life is organized the lower does its morality sink.
E.M. Forster
When any fit of gloominess or perversion of mind lays hold upon you make it a rule not to publish it by complaints.
Samuel Johnson
I wished, as it were, to procrastinate all that related to my feelings of affection until the great object, which swallowed up every habit of my nature, should be completed.
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
Don't get it right - get it WRITTEN!
Lee Child
Eternity is said not to be an extension of time but an absence of time.
Graham Greene
Who does not tremble when he considers how to deal with his wife For not only is he bound to love her but so to live with her that he may return her to God pure and without stain when God who gave shall demand His own again.
Henry VIII of England
But we do not choose our deaths. The Norns do that at the foot of Yggdrasil and I imagined one of those three Fates holding the shears above my thread. She was ready to cut, and all that mattered now was to keep tight hold of my sword so that the winged women would take me to Valhalla's feasting-hall.
Bernard Cornwell
...human beings have a distorted view of risk. They don't see the whole picture. Our perceptions are twisted by stories in the media, by films, by our own personalities and experiences. So, despite the unlikely odds, we still worry about being raped or murdered. We hear a sound in the night and think of burglars, not mice... It's kind of a protective pessimism: if we worry about the worst happening, it may miss our door.
Ruth Dugdall
As there are some flowers which you should smell but slightly to extract all that is pleasant in them ... so there are some men with whom a slight acquaintance is quite sufficient to draw out all that is agreeable a more intimate one would be unsafe and unsatisfactory.
Walter Savage Landor
Trust cannot, in the real world, be just a matter of personal choice.
David Amerland
The seal of Reason, made impregnable:_ The seal of Truth, immeasurably splendid:The seal of Brotherhood, man's miracle:_ The seal of Peace, and Wisdom heaven-descended:The seal of Bitterness, cast down to Hell:_ The seal of Love, secure, not-to-be-rended:The seventh seal, Equality: that, broken,God sets His thunder and earthquake for a token.
Aleister Crowley
We've heard them all talk about Dust, and they're so afraid of it, and you know what? We believed them, even though we could see that what they were doing was wicked and evil and wrong... We thought Dust must be bad too, because they were grown up and they said so. But what if it isn't? What if it's—'She said breathlessly, 'Yeah! What if it's really good...
Philip Pullman
Not a day passes over the earth but men and women of no note do great deeds speak great words and suffer noble sorrows.
Charles Reade
Then very faintly, he heard above his head the low familiar murmur of the sea outside. At once the comfortable noise made him cheerful, and he even remembered what they were supposed to be.
Susan Cooper
Miss Murray is leaning on the door. "Ash, come on. It's time to go." Her hand is so tight on the handle, her knuckles are pale. She's looking at the floor. "Miss Murray?""What?" She doesn't move. I stare at her face but she doesn't return the look. "I love you."The air in the room has frozen, every atom suspended. Then her tense body slackens. Her hand loosens its grip on the door and she turns her head slowly towards me. She meets my gaze for a moment. Her eyes have dark rings under them. Her forehead is creased with worry. Her cheeks are pale. I want to make it all OK. I want to make her happy. I desperately want to touch her face. "I know," she says quietly.
Liz Kessler
Others, I am not the first,Have willed more mischief than they durst:If in the breathless night I tooShiver now, 'tis nothing new.More than I, if truth were told,Have stood and sweated hot and cold,And through their veins in ice and fireFear contended with desire.Agued once like me were they,But I like them shall win my wayLastly to the bed of mouldWhere there's neither heat nor cold.But from my grave across my browPlays no wind of healing now,And fire and ice within me fightBeneath the suffocating night.
A.E. Housman
I hate to hear you talk about all women as if they were fine ladies instead of rational creatures. None of us want to be in calm waters all our lives.
Jane Austen
I suppose it's something to do with her black-brained religion not to take care of the body.
Evelyn Waugh
As soon as I decided I'd have to dig down still deeper to uncover the root of my listless withdrawal from life, I became aware of some interference from the past distracting and confusing my thoughts, causing me a sensation that was at the same time oppressive, expectant and empty. In these somewhat contradictory feelings, I came to recognize my childish sense of having run down like a clock that needed someone to wind it before it could go again; and saw that I was now no less helpless than in those far-off days when I waited for somebody to take me by the hand and tell me what to do. On my own initiative I could do nothing, take no responsibility, make no decisions only watch my existence unroll.
Anna Kavan
Dreaming's great as long as you wake up now and again
Benny Bellamacina
We need to consume less. A lot less. Less food, less energy, less stuff. Fewer cars, electric cars, cotton T-shirts, laptops, mobile phone upgrades. Far fewer.Yet, every decade, global consumption continues to increase relentlessly.
Stephen Emmott
Dear Sigmund,Multiple Personality Disorder is a much discussed topic in my one bedroom bedsit."Signed....Thomas, Jane, Ralf, Tom, Toomey and Spot
Anthony T.Hincks
We reign over the united kingdom of time and eternity
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
But first things first. First, to escape this shell, this egg in which I have gestated, all eyes will be on the fire, all eyes blinded by the smoke, and when I walk out of here, out into your large world with its billions, no one will even see. It's the beauty of light, don't you see, Sam? It reveals, but it also distracts and blinds. It's even better than darkness.
Michael Grant
But above all, above respect and esteem, there was a motive within her of good will which could not be overlooked. It was gratitude. -- Gratitude, not merely for having once loved her, but for loving her still well enough, to forgive all the petulance and acrimony of her manner in rejecting him, and all the unjust accusations accompanying her rejection. He who, she had been persuaded, would avoid her as his greatest enemy, seemed, on this accidental meeting, most eager to preserve the acquaintance, and without any indelicate display of regard, or any peculiarity of manner, where their two selves only were concerned, was soliciting the good opinion of her friends, and bent on making her known to his sister.
Jane Austen
See the Gospel Church secure And founded on a Rock! All her promises are sure Her bulwarks who can shock? Count her every precious shrine Tell to after-ages tell Fortified by power divine The Church can never fail.
Charles Wesley
What is it?" I ask, terrified I have done something wrong."Nothing," Stirling replies, running a finger over his own lips. "I thought it would be different, that's all. Actually, it was like kissing a girl. Isn't that strange?
K.C. Finn
It's a truth universally acknowledged...
Jane Austen
Everyday she loses a bit more of herself , every day another nail in her coffin house payments medical bills and middle aged isolation
Saira Viola
Do not be afraid of books, Miss Bennet. Simply treat them with the respect they deserve, and you will be richly rewarded. You do not have to be clever or rich or have attended celebrated schools or universities in order to appreciate them. It is enough simply to have an open and receptive mind-- and sometimes, it is true, a little perseverance. But you must not be afraid, Miss Bennett, for books do not judge you.
Natasha Farrant
I think I should have no other mortal wants, if I could always have plenty of music. It seems to infuse strength into my limbs and ideas into my brain. Life seems to go on without effort, when I am filled with music.
George Eliot
He wondered reflectively what would happen if you asked a nun where the Gents was. Probably the Pope sent you a sharp note or something.
Neil Gaiman
We, as women, have this slight flaw. Yes, admitting it, we are flawed with a faultless memory in regards to the good and bad in men...Stored within our memory banks is every loving gesture and sugar coated word, thoughtful moments, places, arguments, indiscretions, lies all catalogued, timed and dated...The list, for us, is endless...It is not our fault...You give us so much to remember...
Virginia Alison
Have the courage of your desire.
George R. Gissing
I am perfectly qualified to give you an injection. You're not going to tell me you're afraid of a little prick?""I wouldn't call you that...
Anthony Horowitz
Shall I make you a cup of tea? He asked. It was the classic response to crisis practiced throughout these islands—in England, Scotland, and elsewhere. Emotional turmoil, danger, even disaster could be faced with far greater equanimity if the kettle was switched on. War has been declared! There’s been a major earthquake! The stock market has collapsed! Oh really? Let me put the kettle on….
Alexander McCall Smith