Quotes from Old Filth

Jane Gardam ·  260 pages

Rating: (10.6K votes)


“If you've not been loved as a child, you don't know how to love a child.”
― Jane Gardam, quote from Old Filth


“Present us with a silver cup for something when you're a filthy rich lawyer, I dare say? Yes. You'll be a lawyer. Magnificent memory. Sense of logic, no imagination and no brains.”
― Jane Gardam, quote from Old Filth


“She wanted to take his hand. Her hardest task now as she grew older in the Ministry was to deal with her longing to be touched - hugged, stroked by anyone, any human being - a friend, a lover, a child or even (and here she scented danger) a servant. Of either sex. She prayed about it, asking that God's encircling arms would bring comfort. They did not”
― Jane Gardam, quote from Old Filth


“Judges live with shadows behind them.”
― Jane Gardam, quote from Old Filth


“His colleagues at the Bar called him Filth, but not out of irony. It was because he was considered to be the source of the old joke, Failed In London Try Hong Kong. It was said that he had fled the London Bar, very young, very poor, on a sudden whim just after the War, and had done magnificently well in Hong Kong from the start. Being a modest man, they said, he had called himself a parvenu, a fraud, a carefree spirit.
Filth in fact was no great maker of jokes, was not at all modest about his work and seldom, except in great extremity, went in for whims. He was loved, however, admired, laughed at kindly and still much discussed many years after retirement.”
― Jane Gardam, quote from Old Filth



“The landing stage stood on its high crooked stilts with only one person watching the boat disappear round the bend of the river—a girl of twelve called Ada, the wet-nurse’s eldest child. As”
― Jane Gardam, quote from Old Filth


About the author

Jane Gardam
Born place: in Coatham, North Yorkshire, England, The United Kingdom
Born date July 11, 1928
See more on GoodReads

Popular quotes

“I'm after something far more esoteric than a virginal shag. Though, if you'd like, darlin', I'm certainly up for the task.”
― Alyson Noel, quote from Shadowland


“The stranger came early in February, one wintry day, through a biting wind and a driving snow, the last snowfall of the year, over the down, walking as it seemed from Bramblehurst railway station, and carrying a little black portmanteau in his thickly gloved hand. He was wrapped up from head to foot, and the brim of his soft felt hat hid every inch of his face but the shiny tip of his nose; the snow had piled itself against his shoulders and chest, and added a white crest to the burden he carried. He staggered into the Coarch and Horses, more dead than alive as it seemed, and flung his portmanteau down. "A fire," he cried, "in the name of human charity! A room and a fire!" He stamped and shook the snow from off himself in the bar, and followed Mrs. Hall into her guest parlour to strike his bargain. And with that much introduction, that and a ready acquiescence to terms and a couple of sovereigns flung upon the table, he took up his quarters in the inn.”
― H.G. Wells, quote from The Invisible Man


“Just because you can’t experience everything doesn’t mean you shouldn’t experience anything.”
― Nicola Yoon, quote from Everything, Everything


“Still, it seemed to us that the main reason we were hated must be that we always lived by stealing. From the earliest times, rats lived around the edges of human cities and farms, stowed away on men's ships, gnawed holes in their floors and stole their food. Sometimes we were accused of biting human children; I didn't believe that, nor did any of us⎼unless it was some kind of a subnormal rat, bred in the worst of city slums. And that, of course, can happen to people, too.”
― Robert C. O'Brien, quote from Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH


“And your wife, she's in the pink and so on?"

His expressions were also boyish.

"Very bonny, thank you," said Smiley, trying gallantly to respond in kind.”
― John le Carré, quote from Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy


Interesting books

Capital in the Twenty-First Century
(16.8K)
Capital in the Twent...
by Thomas Piketty
A Red Herring Without Mustard
(31.6K)
A Red Herring Withou...
by Alan Bradley
Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI
(36.8K)
Killers of the Flowe...
by David Grann
Something Rotten
(28.7K)
Something Rotten
by Jasper Fforde
The Divine Conspiracy: Rediscovering Our Hidden Life in God
(8.9K)
The Divine Conspirac...
by Dallas Willard
The Ascent of Man
(5K)
The Ascent of Man
by Jacob Bronowski

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.