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The young always have the same problem – how to rebel and conform at the same time. They have now solved this by defying their parents and copying one another.

Quentin Crisp

I had a friend who had two degrees of being made up: when invited I would say ‘Can I make up?’ and he would say ‘Oh yes – tinted?’, or he would say, ‘Oh yes – clotted?’
QUENTIN CRISP

Being Friend Invite Limited Made Yes
You fall out of your mother’s womb, you crawl across open country under fire, and drop into your grave.
QUENTIN CRISP

Life Love Relationship
The war between the sexes is the only one in which both sides regularly sleep with the enemy.
QUENTIN CRISP

Between Both Enemy One Only Regularly Sex Side Sleep War Which
I take it to be axiomatic that people are revolted by witnessing the shameless gratification of an appetite they do not share.
QUENTIN CRISP

Appetite Axiomatic Gratification People Revolt Shameless Share Take Witness
My mother protected me from the world and my father threatened me with it.
QUENTIN CRISP

Father Mother Protect Threatened World
It is explained that all relationships require a little give and take. This is untrue. Any partnership demands that we give and give and give and at the last, as we flop into our graves exhausted, we are told that we didn’t give enough.
QUENTIN CRISP

All Explain Give Little Relationship Require Take Untrue
I don’t like peas, and I’m glad I don’t like them, because if I liked them I would eat them and I hate them.
QUENTIN CRISP

Eat Glad Hate Like Peas Them
The very purpose of existence is to reconcile the glowing opinion we hold of ourselves with the appalling things that other people think about us.
QUENTIN CRISP

Appalling Existence Glow Opinion Other Ourselves People Purpose Reconcile Thing Think
The … problem that confronts homosexuals is that they set out to win the love of a “real” man. If they succeed, they fail. A man who “goes with” other men is not what they would call a real man. The conundrum is incapable of resolution, but that does not make homosexuals give it up.
QUENTIN CRISP

Confront Fail Homosexual Love Man Out Problem Real Set Succeed Win
Fashion is not style. Nay, we can say more: Fashion is instead of style. Style is an idiom springing spontaneously from the personality but deliberately maintained.
QUENTIN CRISP

Deliberate Fashion Idiom Instead Maintain Personality Spontaneously Style
The trouble with children is that they’re not returnable.
QUENTIN CRISP

Children Returnable Trouble
Development of character consists solely in moving toward self-sufficiency.
QUENTIN CRISP

Character Consist Develop Move Self Sorely Sufficiency Toward
Our clothes are too much a part of us for most of us ever to be entirely indifferent to their condition: it is as though the fabric were indeed a natural extension of the body, or even of the soul.
QUENTIN CRISP

Cloth Condition Ever Fabric Indeed Indifferent Most Much Our Part Though Too
There are three reasons for becoming a writer: the first is that you need the money; the second that you have something to say that you think the world should know; the third is that you can’t think what to do with the long winter evenings.
QUENTIN CRISP

Become Evening First Long Money Need Reason Say Second Something Third Write Writer
I don’t think you can really be proud of being gay because it isn’t something you’ve done. You can only be proud of not being ashamed.
QUENTIN CRISP

Ashamed Being Gay Proud Really Something Sone Think
The British do not expect happiness. I had the impression, all the time that I lived there, that they do not want to be happy; they want to be right.
QUENTIN CRISP

Country Do Expect Happiness Impression Live Not Time

The young always have the same problem – how to rebel and conform at the same time. They have now solved this by defying their parents and copying one another.

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The young always have the same problem – how to rebel and conform at the same time. They have now solved this by defying their parents and copying one another.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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