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If I have any talent at all, it is not for doing but for being.

Quentin Crisp

He knew them only ‘in Braille’ – the curtains were never drawn back in the rooms in Oxford where he met those boys. It was the most sordid life you can imagine. And he was bleating about love and dragging the fair name of Mr. Plato into the trial – after a life like that?
QUENTIN CRISP

Back Bleat Curtain Drag Drawn Life Love Name People Person Room
Vice is its own reward.
QUENTIN CRISP

Own Reward Vice
People are not heterosexual or homosexual, just sexual.
QUENTIN CRISP

Heterosexual Homosexual Just People Sexual
Manners are a way of getting what you want without appearing to be an absolute swine.
QUENTIN CRISP

Absolute Appear Get Manner Swine Want Way
Mainstream people dislike homosexuality because they can’t help concentrating on what homosexual men do to one another. And when you contemplate what people do, you think of yourself doing it. And they don’t like that. That’s the famous joke:
QUENTIN CRISP

Another Concentrate Dislike Help Homosexually Mainstream Men One People
If you describe things as better than they are, you are considered to be a romantic; if you describe things as worse than they are, you will be called a realist; and if you describe things exactly as they are, you will be thought of as a satirist.
QUENTIN CRISP

Be Better Consider Describe Romantic Thing Will Worse
In England, nobody’s your friend.
QUENTIN CRISP

Country Friend Nobisy One Liner Your
There is no need to do any housework at all. After the first four years the dirt doesn’t get any worse.
QUENTIN CRISP

At All Housework Need To Do
Though intelligence is powerless to modify character, it is a dab hand at finding euphemisms for its weaknesses.
QUENTIN CRISP

Character Dab Euphemism Find Hand Intelligence Modify Powerless Weakness
Look inward and ask not if there is anything outside you want, but whether there is anything inside that you have not yet unpacked.
QUENTIN CRISP

Anything Ask Inside Look Outside Unpack
Development of character consists solely in moving toward self-sufficiency.
QUENTIN CRISP

Character Consist Develop Move Self Sorely Sufficiency Toward
It may be true that artists adopt a flamboyant appearance, but it’s also true that people who look funny get stuck with the arts.
QUENTIN CRISP

Adopt Also Appearance Art Artist Flamboyant Funny Look People Stuck True
What my parents thought of this, I don’t know. But they bore it. And the real problem was not my sin, but my unemployability.
QUENTIN CRISP

Bore Know Parent Problem Real Sin Thought Unemployability
Fashion is not style. Nay, we can say more: Fashion is instead of style. Style is an idiom springing spontaneously from the personality but deliberately maintained.
QUENTIN CRISP

Deliberate Fashion Idiom Instead Maintain Personality Spontaneously Style
I asked a girl who came from America to England, when I was only English, and she admitted she had been to a drama school. And I said, “What did they teach you?” And she said, “They taught me to be a candle burning in an empty room.”
QUENTIN CRISP

Admit Ask Been Burn Came Candle Country Drama Empty English Girl Out Room School She Taught Teach
If I were God – and I never understand why I’m not – I should say, “Shop around, I don’t think you’ll find a better bargain than here.”
QUENTIN CRISP

Around Bargain Better Find God Shop Should Think Understand

If I have any talent at all, it is not for doing but for being.

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If I have any talent at all, it is not for doing but for being.

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Popular Authors

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