Artists, celebrated for their humanity, they turn out to be scarcely human at all.
ALAN BENNETTOnce I start a book I finish it. That was the way one was brought up.
More Alan Bennett Quotes
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Children always assume the sexual lives of their parents come to a grinding halt at their conception.
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I think perhaps that’s why I live in Ibiza, because the blue of the Mediterranean, you see, reminds me of the blue of the eyes of those Doncaster miners.
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Those who have known the famous are publicly debriefed of their memories.
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I can walk. It’s just that I’m so rich I don’t need to.
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So boring you fall asleep halfway through her name.
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They 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.
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The nearest my parents came to alcohol was at Holy Communion and they utterly overestimated its effects.
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[B]riefing is not reading. In fact it is the antithesis of reading. Briefing is terse, factual and to the point.
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If you find yourself born in Barnsley and then set your sights on being Virginia Woolf it is not going to be roses all the way.
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It [Cambridge] wasn’t a holy grail in the sense that I’d never been to Cambridge.
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If I am doing nothing, I like to be doing nothing to some purpose. That is what leisure means.
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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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I’m all in favour of free expression provided it’s kept rigidly under control.
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Our father the novelist; my husband the poet. He belongs to the ages – just don’t catch him at breakfast.
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Sometimes there is no next time, no time-outs, no second chances. Sometimes it’s now or never.
ALAN BENNETT