Schweitzer in the Congo did not derive more moral credit than Larkin did for living in Hull.
ALAN BENNETTThey may not have two spondees to rub together but they still want to pen their saga untrammelled by life-threatening activities like trailing round Sainsbury’s, emptying the dishwasher or going to the nativity play.
More Alan Bennett Quotes
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Our perspective on the past alters. Looking back, immediately in front of us is dead ground.
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I’m for the freedom of expression, given that it will be under strict control.
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I’m not good at precise, coherent argument. But plays are suited to incoherent argument, put into the mouths of fallible people.
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You have the knowledge but that does not entitle you to be superior. Knowledge makes you the servant not the master.
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I bet Tom Stoppard doesn’t have to do this’ or There is no doubt David Hare would have deputed this to an underling.’
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The masters had no idea what was expected of you in the scholarship exam, so you just had to busk it really.
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And if it can be explained that it can be explained away.’ ‘But this is History. Distance yourselves.
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Over the years Miss Shepherd was visited by a succession of social workers so the character in the play is a composite figure.
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Life is like a box of sardines and we are all looking for the key.
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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.
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I saw someone peeing in Jermym Street the other day. I thought, is this the end of civilization as we know it? Or is it simply someone peeing in Jermyn Street?
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The longer I practise medicine, the more convinced I am there are only two types of cases: those that involve taking the trousers off and those that don’t.
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I don’t talk very well. With writing, you’ve time to get it right. Also I’ve found the more I talk the less I write, and if I didn’t write no one would want me to talk anyway.
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We still don’t like to admit the war was even partly our fault because so many of our people died.
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Books generally just confirm you in what you have, perhaps unwittingly, decided to do already.
ALAN BENNETT