Quotes from Cyril Connolly

The secret of success is to be in harmony with existence, to be always calm to let each wave of life wash us a little farther up the shore.

We must select the illusion which appeals to our temperament and embrace it with passion, if we want to be happy

A lazy person, whatever the talents with which he starts out, have condemned himself to second-rate thoughts, and to second-rate friends

Obesity is a mental state, a disease brought on by boredom and disappointment.

The dread of loneliness is greater than the fear of bondage, so we get married.

The goal of every culture is to decay through over-civilization; the factors of decadence, -- LUXURY, scepticism, weariness and superstition, -- are constant. The civilization of one epoch becomes the manure of the next.

The one way to get thin is to re-establish a purpose in life.

Slums may well be breeding grounds of crime, but middle class suburbs are incubators of apathy and delirium.

Our memories are card indexes consulted and then returned in disorder by authorities whom we do not control.

There are many who dare not kill themselves for fear of what the neighbors will say.

Imagination is nostalgia for the past, the absent; it is the liquid solution in which art develops the snapshot of reality.

The true function of a writer is to produce a masterpiece and no other task is of any consequence.

Vulgarity is the garlic in the salad of life.

There is no more somber enemy of good art than the pram in the hall.

Every admirer is a potential enemy.

There is no pain equal to that which two lovers can inflict on one another. This should be made clear to all who contemplate such a union. The avoidance of this pain is the beginning of wisdom, for it is strong enough to contaminate the rest of our lives.

We love but once, for once only are we perfectly equipped for loving.

A mistake which is commonly made about neurotics is to suppose that they are interesting. It is not interesting to be always unhappy, engrossed with oneself, malignant and ungrateful, and never quite in touch with reality.

The worst vice of the solitary is the worship of his food.

Imprisoned in every fat man a thin one is wildly signaling to be let out.

It is only in the country that we can get to know a person or a book.

The artist one day falls through a hole in the brambles, and from that moment he is following the dark rapids of an underground river which may sometimes flow so near to the surface that the laughing picnic parties are heard above.

Words today are like the shells and rope of seaweed which a child brings home glistening from the beach and which in an hour have lost their luster.

The dread of lonliness is greater than the fear of bondage, so we get married.