I’m not “happy” but I’m not unhappy about it.
ALAN BENNETTPut him in a nice detached villa and he’d never have written a word.
More Alan Bennett Quotes
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Schweitzer in the Congo did not derive more moral credit than Larkin did for living in Hull.
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There’s very little in the substance of [THE LADY IN THE VAN] which is not fact though some adjustments have had to be made.
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I turned down a knighthood. It would be like having to wear a suit every day of your life.
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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.
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Remember. You are a physician. You are not a policeman nor are you a minister of religion.
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The days weren’t long enough for the reading she wanted to do.
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So, half a dozen of us tried – not all of us in history – and we all eventually got in. So, to that extent, it [The History Boys] comes out of my own experience.
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History is a commentary on the various and continuing incapabilities of men. What is history? History is women following behind with the bucket.
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We have fish and chips, which W. and I fetch from the shop in Settle market-place.
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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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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.
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What I’m above all primarily concerned with is the substance of life, the pith of reality.
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Nor did they seem to think one had done them a kindness by reading their writings. Rather they had done one the kindness by writing them.
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I’m all in favour of free expression provided it’s kept rigidly under control.
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But most men regard their life as a poem that women threaten.
ALAN BENNETT