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The trouble is, as soon as you’ve chosen somebody it obscures anybody else you might have thought of.

Alan Bennett

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.
ALAN BENNETT

All Effort Left Nothing Went
Books are not about passing the time. They’re about other lives. Other worlds.
ALAN BENNETT

Book Live Other Pass Time World
But then, when I did go, the contrast between Leeds, which was very black and sooty in those days, and Cambridge, which seemed like something out of a fairystory, in the grip of a hard frost, was just wonderful.
ALAN BENNETT

Balck Cambridge Contrast Day Fairstory Frost Hard Leed Seem Something Sooty Wonderful
If you find yourself born in Barnsley and then set your sights on being Virginia Woolf it is not going to be roses all the way.
ALAN BENNETT

Being Born Find Go People Rose Sight Virginia Way Wool Yourself
What I’m above all primarily concerned with is the substance of life, the pith of reality.
ALAN BENNETT

Above Concern Pith Primarily Reality Substance
The sheer endlessness of books outfaced her and she had no idea how to go on; there was no system to her reading, with one book leading to another, and often she had two or three on the go at the same time.
ALAN BENNETT

Another Book Endlessness Idea Lead Outface Raed Same Sheer System Time
And if it can be explained that it can be explained away.’ ‘But this is History. Distance yourselves.
ALAN BENNETT

Away Can Distance Explain History Yourself
To read is to withdraw.To make oneself unavailable. One would feel easier about it if the pursuit inself were less…selfish.
ALAN BENNETT

Make Oneself Read Unavailable Withdraw
What she was finding also was how one book led to another, doors kept opening wherever she turned and the days weren’t long enough for the reading she wanted to do.
ALAN BENNETT

Another Book Door Find Kept Open Process Turn
I’ve never seen the point of the sea, except where it meets the land. The shore has a point. The sea has none.
ALAN BENNETT

Except Land Meet never Point Sea Seen Shore
Imagine that. Per person. This means that if the time scale is diminished in proportion to that of space it would be quite possible for the whole story of Greece and Rome to be played out between farts.
ALAN BENNETT

Between Diminish Fart Imagine Impossible Person Proportion Space Time Whole Stoy
Your whole life is on the other side of the glass. And there is nobody watching.
ALAN BENNETT

Glass Life Nobody Other Side Watch Whole
A photograph on every mantlepiece. And all this mourning has veiled the truth. It’s not so much lest we forget, as lest we remember.
ALAN BENNETT

Every Forget Lest Mantlepiece Mourn Much Photograph Remember Veiled
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.
ALAN BENNETT

Cambridge Headmaster Leed Oxford School State Student University Usually
Life is rather like a tin of sardines – we’re all of us looking for the key.
ALAN BENNETT

Key Life Look Rather Sardine Tin
I think perhaps that’s why I live in Ibiza, because the blue of the Mediterranean, you see, reminds me of the blue of the eyes of those Doncaster miners.
ALAN BENNETT

Blue Eye Live Perhaps Remind Think

The trouble is, as soon as you’ve chosen somebody it obscures anybody else you might have thought of.

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The trouble is, as soon as you’ve chosen somebody it obscures anybody else you might have thought of.

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