“In the way of circumstances and background to transcend I had everything an artist could possibly want. It was practically a blueprint.”

Remember. You are a physician. You are not a policeman nor are you a minister of religion.

Why is it always the “intelligent” people who are socialists?

If I am doing nothing, I like to be doing nothing to some purpose. That is what leisure means.

Culminating with a man in a white coat saying to one kindly, “And now can you tell me the name of the Prime Minister?”

Schweitzer in the Congo did not derive more moral credit than Larkin did for living in Hull.

Put him in a nice detached villa and he’d never have written a word.

My school was a state school in Leeds and the headmaster usually sent students to Leeds University but he didn’t normally send them to Oxford or Cambridge.

I’m for the freedom of expression, given that it will be under strict control.

Nature played a cruel trick on her by giving her a waxed mustache.

All the effort went into getting there and then I had nothing left. I thought I’d got somewhere, then I found I had to go on.

Art comes out of art; it begins with imitation, often in the form of parody, and it’s in the process of imitating the voice of others that one comes to learn the sound of one’s own.

We were put to Dickens as children but it never quite took. That unremitting humanity soon had me cheesed off.

Deluded liberal that I am, I persist in thinking that those with a streak of sexual unorthodoxy ought to be more tolerant of their fellows than those who lead an entirely godly, righteous and sober life.

God doesn’t do notes, either. Did Jesus Christ say, “Can I be excused the Crucifixion?” No!

There is no such thing as a good script, onlya good film, and I’m conscious that my scripts often read better than they play.

Of course they’re out of date. Standards are always out of date. That is what makes them standards.

The Welfare State, South Africa – and it becomes impossible to seriously confront any of them without understanding their historical background.

They support the concept of it even though they know it won’t work to keep guns out of the hands of criminals they figure ‘well if criminals aren’t supposed to have guns what’s the big deal about a background check,’

If you don’t have the background awareness of oneness, duality becomes real.

My background is deep and set in deep time, and in a narrow space.

Sometimes love is quite, lingering in the background until you least expect it. But love it always there for you

Sports can unite a group of people from different backgrounds, all working together to achieve a common goal.

Mr. McVicker instilled self-respect in those of us who were his students, because he respected us regardless of our background.

I’m a self-taught guitarist, but I have a classical music background.