Quotes from Goodbye to All That

Robert Graves ·  281 pages

Rating: (8.3K votes)


“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


About the author

Robert Graves
Born place: in Wimbledon, The United Kingdom
Born date July 24, 1895
See more on GoodReads

Popular quotes

“Nobody knows how things will turn out when they start a relationship, whether they will stay together or not.”
― Sharlyn G. Branson, quote from Limits of Destiny


“Sometimes when we forget to do things for others, it's because we're too wrapped up in our own problems.”
― John Green, quote from Let it Snow


“We rework our own memories and reinvent ourselves to suit our tastes and predilections every day.”
― Kiran Nagarkar, quote from Cuckold


“Prudence, my prophet,’ the sorcerer rebuked. ‘The results of prophecies often resolve through strangely twisted circumstance.’ But if Asandir was yet aware that the promised talents were split between princes who were enemies with blood debts of seven generations, he said nothing.”
― Janny Wurts, quote from The Curse of the Mistwraith


“Self-justification, that was the danger-- the exhilerating exercise of explaining why my ways are God's ways after all.”
― Hugh Nibley, quote from Approaching Zion


Interesting books

Still Life with Bread Crumbs
(44.1K)
Still Life with Brea...
by Anna Quindlen
A Time to Speak
(291)
A Time to Speak
by Nadine Brandes
Bay's End
(330)
Bay's End
by Edward Lorn
Lichgates
(2.7K)
Lichgates
by S.M. Boyce
Love May Fail
(4.9K)
Love May Fail
by Matthew Quick
Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life
(2.1K)

About BookQuoters

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.