“Nor had I any illusions about Algernon Charles Swinburne, who often used to stop my perambulator when he met it on Nurses’ Walk, at the edge of Wimbledon Common, and pat me on the head and kiss me: he was an inveterate pram-stopper and patter and kisser.”
― Robert Graves, quote from Goodbye to All That
“About this business of being a gentleman: I paid so heavily for the fourteen years of my gentleman’s education that I feel entitled, now and then, to get some sort of return.”
― Robert Graves, quote from Goodbye to All That
“Cuinchy bred rats. They came up from the canal, fed on the plentiful corpses, and multiplied exceedingly. While I stayed here with the Welsh, a new officer joined the company... When he turned in that night, he heard a scuffling, shone his torch on the bed, and found two rats on his blanket tussling for the possession of a severed hand.”
― Robert Graves, quote from Goodbye to All That
“Swinburne, by the way, when a very young man, had gone to Walter Savage Landor, then a very old man, and been given the poet’s blessing he asked for; and Landor when a child had been patted on the head by Dr Samuel Johnson; and Johnson when a child had been taken to London to be touched by Queen Anne for scrofula, the King’s evil; and Queen Anne when a child...”
― Robert Graves, quote from Goodbye to All That
“This is a story of what I was, not what I am.”
― Robert Graves, quote from Goodbye to All That
“England looked strange to us returned soldiers. We could not understand the war-madness that ran wild everywhere, looking for a pseudo-military outlet. The civilians talked a foreign language. I found serious conversation with my parents all but impossible.”
― Robert Graves, quote from Goodbye to All That
“...but [I] had sworn on the very day of my demobilization never to be under anyone’s orders for the rest of my life. Somehow I must live by writing.”
― Robert Graves, quote from Goodbye to All That
Robert Graves
Born place: in Wimbledon, The United Kingdom
Born date July 24, 1895
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“CAN YOU PLAY A MAN'S PART? 'If you are walking with your mother, sister or best girl and some one passes a slighting remark or uses improper language, won't you be ashamed if you can't take her part? Well, can you? 'We teach boxing and self-defense by mail. Many pupils have written saying that after a few lessons they've outboxed bigger and heavier opponents. The lessons start with simple movements practised before your mirror—holding out your hand for a coin, the breast-stroke in swimming, etc. Before you realize it you are striking scientifically, ducking, guarding and feinting, just as if you had a real opponent before you.”
― Sinclair Lewis, quote from Babbitt
“Our precious time together feels like a candle with wicks burning at both ends. Once the flame meets in the middle, we're over.”
― Georgia Cates, quote from Beauty from Pain
“She believed in the miraculous. Or she had, until she reached an age when, all of a sudden, she realized that the life she was living, was in fact, her life. The clay of her being, so long infinitely malleable, had been formed, hardened into what now seemed a palpable, unchanging object. A shell she inhabited. It shocked her then. It shocked her now, like a slap in the face. ”
― Robert Goolrick, quote from A Reliable Wife
“If there was one kind of hat Terry despised above all others, it was the baseball cap. There was nothing wrong with children wearing it, of course, but whenever he saw it on the head of an adult it seemed to symbolize everything that he most hated about America, even more potently than the figure of Mickey Mouse or the latest Coke adverts or the hordes of giant yellow ‘M’s which were even now beginning to advance across Britain like an unchecked virus. And even worse, Kingsley was wearing it back to front. This, without doubt, was the ultimate badge of imbecility.”
― Jonathan Coe, quote from The House of Sleep
“What does a bigot do when he meets someone who challenges his opinions? He doesn’t give. He stays rigid. Doesn’t even try to listen, just lashes out.”
― Harper Lee, quote from Go Set a Watchman
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Tournament of Losers
The Reluctant Assass...BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.
We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.
Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.
