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At eighty things do not occur; they recur.

Alan Bennett

The nearest my parents came to alcohol was at Holy Communion and they utterly overestimated its effects.
ALAN BENNETT

Alcohol Communion Effect Holy Near Overestimate Parent Utterly
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
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
[B]riefing is not reading. In fact it is the antithesis of reading. Briefing is terse, factual and to the point.
ALAN BENNETT

Antithesis Brief Fact Factual Point Raed Terse
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.
ALAN BENNETT

Dozen Eventually Experience Extent Half History Own Try
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
Far from wanting time to pass, one just wishes one had more of it. If one wanted to pass the time one could go to New Zealand.
ALAN BENNETT

Country More Pass Time Want Wish
Our perspective on the past alters. Looking back, immediately in front of us is dead ground.
ALAN BENNETT

Alter Back Dead Front Ground Immediately Look One Past Perspective
I was an only child. I lost both my parents. By the time I was twenty I was bald. I’m homosexual.
ALAN BENNETT

Bald Both Child Homosexual Only Parent Time Twenty
And now, here it is, set down by someone else, a person you have never met, someone even who is long dead. And it is as if a hand has come out, and taken yours
ALAN BENNETT

Come Dead Down Hand Long Person Set Someone Your
Have you ever thought, headmaster, that your standards might perhaps be a little out of date?
ALAN BENNETT

Add Ever Headmaster Little might Out Perhaps Standard Thought
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
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
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.
ALAN BENNETT

Art Begin Come Form Imitate Parofy Process Voice
Illogically, I tend to assume that if you ( Philip Larkin) dream of caning schoolgirls bottoms, it disqualifies you from dismissing half the nation as work-shy.
ALAN BENNETT

Assume Bottom Caning Dismiss Disqualify Dream Half Illogically Nation Schoolgirl Shy Work
Books are not about passing time. They’re about other lives. Other worlds.
ALAN BENNETT

Book Live Other Pass Time World
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
That’s a bit like asking a man crawling across the Sahara whether he would prefer Perrier or Malvern water.
ALAN BENNETT

Across Ask Bid Crawl Malvern Perier Prefer Sahara Water
I’m not “happy” but I’m not unhappy about it.
ALAN BENNETT

Happy Unhappy
History is a commentary on the various and continuing incapabilities of men. What is history? History is women following behind with the bucket.
ALAN BENNETT

Behind Bucket Commentary Continue Follow History Incapability Men Various Women
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?
ALAN BENNETT

Civilization Day End Know Other Pee Somebody Thought
One of the hardest things for boys to learn is that a teacher is human.
ALAN BENNETT

Hardest Human One Learn Teacher Thing
It’s like going to a place that you’ve never been to before – you’ve got a picture of it and then you go there and that picture is totally wiped out by the reality.
ALAN BENNETT

Go Like Out Pace Picture Reality Total Wipe
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
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
Of course my standards are out of date! That’s why they’re called standards.
ALAN BENNETT

Call Course Date Out Standard
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

At eighty things do not occur; they recur.

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At eighty things do not occur; they recur.

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