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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.

Alan Bennett

The Breed never dies. Sapper, Buchan, Dornford Yates, practitioners in that school of Snobbery withViolence that runs like a thread of good-class tweed through twentieth-century literature.
ALAN BENNETT

Breed Class Die Good Like Literature never People Practitioner Run School Snobbery Thread Violence
I write plays about things that I can’t resolve in my mind. I try to root things out.
ALAN BENNETT

Mind Out Play Resolve Root Thing Write
It seems to me the mark of a civilized society that certain privileges should be taken for granted such as education, health care and the safety to walk the streets.
ALAN BENNETT

Certain Civilize Education Grant Privilege Seem Society Taken
Children always assume the sexual lives of their parents come to a grinding halt at their conception.
ALAN BENNETT

Always Assume Children Come Conception Grind Live Parent Sexual
The trouble is, as soon as you’ve chosen somebody it obscures anybody else you might have thought of.
ALAN BENNETT

Anybody Chosen Else Night Obscure Somebody Soon Thought Trouble
Philip Larkin used to cheer himself up by looking in the mirror and saying the line from Rebecca, ‘I am Mrs de Winter now!
ALAN BENNETT

Cheer Himself I Lok Mirror Now People Skyline Use Winter
I bet Tom Stoppard doesn’t have to do this’ or There is no doubt David Hare would have deputed this to an underling.’
ALAN BENNETT

Bet Depute Doubt Stoppard Underling
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, bread and butter, mashed potato – one finishes what’s on one’s plate. That’s always been my philosophy.
ALAN BENNETT

Book Bread Butter Finish Mash One Philosophy Plate Potato
His writing is that of someone whose whole life was spent in apartments, with lifts, stairwells, muffled voices behind closed doors, and sounds through walls.
ALAN BENNETT

Apartment Door Someone Sound Spent Wall Write
Here I sit, alone at 60, Bald and fat and full of sin Cold the seat, and loud the cistern As I read the (Harpic) (Lysol) tin
ALAN BENNETT

Alone Cistern Cold Full Loud Seat Sit Sixty
If, for instance, we’d made the film after the show had been to Broadway, it would have been exactly the same film but we would have been assured that they would have understood it.
ALAN BENNETT

Assure Broadway Exactly Film Instance Made Same Show Understand
I dont know whether you’ve ever looked into a miner’s eyes for any length of time, that is. Because it is the loveliest blue you’ve ever seen.
ALAN BENNETT

Blue Every Eye Know Length Look Loveliest Miner Seen Time Yet
But then books, as I’m sure you know, seldom prompt a course of action.
ALAN BENNETT

Action Aure Book Buy Know Prompt Se; Dom
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
Artists, celebrated for their humanity, they turn out to be scarcely human at all.
ALAN BENNETT

All Artist Celebrate Human Humanity Scarcely Turn
Books did not care who was reading them or whether one read them or not. All readers were equal, herself included. Literature, she thought, is a commonwealth; letters a republic.
ALAN BENNETT

Book Commonwealth Equal Herself Literature Read Reader Republic
We don’t see it, and because we don’t see it this means that there is no period so remote as the recent past.
ALAN BENNETT

Down Mean No Past Period Recent Remote See
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
The days weren’t long enough for the reading she wanted to do.
ALAN BENNETT

Day Enough Long Raed Want
My films are about embarrassment.
ALAN BENNETT

Embarrassment Film
Remember. You are a physician. You are not a policeman nor are you a minister of religion.
ALAN BENNETT

Cloth Minister Owner Physician Religion Remember
I lack what the English call character, by which they mean the power to refrain.
ALAN BENNETT

Call Character English Lack Mean Power Refrain
Nature played a cruel trick on her by giving her a waxed mustache.
ALAN BENNETT

Cruel Give Nature Paly Trick Waxed
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
The Waste Land not figuring very largely in Mam’s scheme of things. “The thing is,” I said finally, “he won the Nobel Prize.” “Well,” she said, with that unerring grasp of inessentials which is the prerogative of mothers, “I’m not surprised. It was a beautiful overcoat.”
ALAN BENNETT

Beautiful Figure Final Grasp Inessential Land Large Nobel Overcoat Prerogative Prize Scheme Thing Waste
I can walk. It’s just that I’m so rich I don’t need to.
ALAN BENNETT

Just Need Rich Walk

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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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.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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