Quotes from Alan Bennett

Librarians who are arguing and lobbying for clever ebook lending solutions are completely missing the point. They are defending library as warehouse as opposed to fighting for the future, which is librarian as producer, concierge, connector, teacher and impresario.

One has given one's white-gloved hand to hands that were steeped in blood and conversed politely with men who have personally slaughtered children. One has waded through excrement and gore; to be Queen, I have often thought the one essential item of equipment a pair of thigh-length boots.

Aamulla kuningattarella oli vähän nuhaa, ja koska sovittuja tapaamisia ei ollut, hän sanoi olevansa ehkä vilustunut ja jäi vuoteeseen. Se ei ollut hänelle tyypillistä eikä myöskään totta, hän sanoi sen oikeastaan vains siksi että saisi jatkaa lukemista.

But ma'am must have been briefed, surely?' 'Of course,' said the Queen, 'but briefing is not reading. In fact it is the antithesis of reading. Briefing is terse, factual and to the point. Reading is untidy, discursive and perpetually inviting. Briefing closes down a subject, reading opens it up.

Silläkin riskillä että kuulostan paistilta, kuningatar sanoi, kirjat tekevät ihmisestä kypsemmän.

Books are wonderful, aren't they?' she said to the vice-chancellor who concurred. 'At the risk of sounding like a piece of steak,' she said, 'they tenderise one.

the more institutions and freedoms and benefits one can take for granted – of which in my view free state-supported galleries and museums come high on the list – the more civilised a society is.

She wasn't wholly infatuated, though she liked the way he looked; but, so too did he and that unfatuated her a bit.

Had she been asked if reading had enriched her life she would have had to say yes, undoubtedly, though adding with equal certainty that it had at the same time drained her life of all purpose.

To read is to withdraw. To make oneself unavailable. One would feel easier about it', said Sir Kevin, 'if the pursuit itself were less … selfish.

Yet still the unresting castles thresh In fullgrown thickness every May. Last year is dead, they seem to say, Begin afresh, afresh, afresh.

it is seldom at the frontier that discoveries are made but more often in the dustbin.

Desde luego-dijo la reina-, pero aleccionar no es leer. De hecho es la antítesis de la lectura. Aleccionar es sucinto, concreto y pertinente. Leer es desordenado, disperso y siempre incitante. El aleccionamiento cierra un tema, la lectura lo abre.

Unlike today's ideologues, whom I would call single-minded if mind came into it at all, I have no fear of the state.

Miss S. bevorzugte das pathetische Wort 'land' gegenüber dem üblichen 'country'. 'This land …' In diesem Sinne gebraucht, ist es zwar nicht direkt die Sprache des Wahnsinns, aber doch der Besessenheit. Zeugen Jehovas sprechen ständig von 'this land', ebenso die National Front. Land ist gleich country plus Vorsehung – ein Land im Angesicht Gottes. Auch Mrs. Thatcher sagt 'this land'.

At eighty, things do not occur; they recur.

The closest she got to pretence was politeness.

Proust's is a long book, though, water- skiing permitting, you could get through it in the summer recess

may the day never come when patients are referred to or thought of as customers. The word patient means a sufferer and when someone comes to the doctor they are coming not because they want to buy something but because they want help. Structure and restructure the Health Service how you will doctors are not shopkeepers, patients are not customers and medicine is not a product.

Stava anche scoprendo che un libro tira l'altro; ovunque si voltava si aprivano nuove porte e le giornate erano troppo corte per leggere quanto avrebbe voluto. Ma era dispiaciuta, e anche mortificata, al pensiero di tutte le occasioni che si era lasciata sfuggire.

Etiquette may be bad, but embarassment is worse.

When he dipped his cake in his tea - a disgusting business - the whole of his life came back to him. When I did it nothing happened.

She was discrete about writing in her notebooks … This too pointed to potential derangement. What had her majesty to note down? She never used to do it. And like any change in behavior of the elderly, it was readily put down to decay. Probably Alzheimer's.

I cannot heave my heart into my mouth, is a sentiment I can readily endorse. Her predicament is mine.