top of page
.png){kind=small}
Quotes by British Authors
"I've always enjoyed writing, I graduated with a degree in English; I've done bits of journalism."
"Political conflicts distort and disturb a people's sense of distinction between matters of importance and matters of urgency. What is vital is disguised by what is merely a matter of well being."
"It's like trying to pin down a kangaroo on a trampoline."
"A losing trade, I assure you, sir: literature is a drug."
"I had never passed a single school exam, and clearly never would."
"Almost the moment he died, they put him in Playboy as one of the greatest drummers, which he was - there's no doubt about it. There's never been anybody since. He's one of the greatest drummers that ever lived."
"My two fingers on a typewriter have never connected with my brain. My hand on a pen does. A fountain pen, of course. Ball-point pens are only good for filling out forms on a plane."
"He who is completely sanctified, or cleansed from all sin, and dies in this state, is fit for glory."
"Sex: the pleasure is momentary, the position ridiculous, and the expense damnable."
"The law is not a "light" for you or any man to see by; the law is not an instrument of any kind. The law is a causeway upon which so long as he keeps to it a citizen may walk safely."
"We always had chocolates and my mother was careful to make sure they were unwrapped in advance so the paper wouldn't rustle in the middle of a performance."
"There was always a lot of American music in England until, obviously when the Beatles came around, then there was a shift towards English music, but before then American music was the main thing."
"I remember in the early days when we played six nights a week for a month and I was doing my long drum solo every night. My hands were covered in blisters."
"There are periods in history when change is necessary, and other periods when it is better to keep everything for the time as it is. The art of life is to be in the rhythm of your age."
"Let them show me a cottage where there are not the same vices of which they accuse the courts."
"An involuntary return to the point of departure is, without doubt, the most disturbing of all journeys."
"Genius does what it must, and talent does what it can."
"There's one thing better than having a great actor, and that's having a great actor who's never done this kind of role before and is hungry to do it. They're testing themselves every day. They want to get out of their trailer and get to work."
"I regret that I wasn't the kind of person who could enjoy celebrity. It embarrassed me too much."
"Familiarity with evil breeds not contempt but acceptance."
"Hooks need to be predictable and not predictable at the same time."
"A stone is ingrained with geological and historical memories."
"It seems to be the fate of idealists to obtain what they have struggled for in a form which destroys their ideals."
"Any Reform Bill which is worth a moment's thought, or the smallest effort to carry it, must at least double, and it ought to do much more than double, the representation of the metropolitan boroughs and of all the great cities of the United Kingdom."
"One said of suicide, As long as one has brains one should not blow them out. And another answered, But when one has ceased to have them, too often one cannot."
"I mean I think children love the idea that there are different viewpoints and different words for things and different worlds. And the more that they pretend to be other people, the harder it is for them to hate them and misunderstand them when they grow up."
"The modern habit of doing ceremonial things unceremoniously is no proof of humility; rather it proves the offender's inability to forget himself in the rite, and his readiness to spoil for every one else the proper pleasure of ritual."
"We are not won by arguments that we can analyse but by tone and temper, by the manner which is the man himself."
"I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being with an independent will."
"It is much more important to be oneself than anything else."
"The true test of one's mettle is how many times you will try before you give up."
"I have learned more from my mistakes than from my successes."
"There are people who claim to be instinctive cooks, who never follow recipes or weigh anything at all. All I can say is they're not very fussy about what they eat. For me, cooking is an exact art and not some casual game."
"I wanted to be Gene Kelly. Well really, I just wanted to dance with Cyd Charisse."
"We are so blinkered by progress, so preoccupied with where we want to go and how fast we can travel, that many of us have lost the ability to simply 'stop'."
bottom of page