Quotes from Evelyn Waugh

More even than the work of the great architects, I loved buildings that grew silently with the centuries, catching and keeping the best of each generation, while time curbed the artist's pride and the Philistine's vulgarity, and repaired the clumsiness of the dull workman.

Ta näis sõnatult ütlevat: Vaadake mind. Ma olen oma panuse andnud. Ma olen kaunis. See minu ilu on midagi täiesti ebatavalist. Ma olen loodud inimeste rõõmuks. Aga mis ma ise sellest saan? Kus on minu tasu? See oligi viimase kümne aasta peamine muutus; ja see tegelikult oligi tema tasu - see teda igavesti saatev nõiduslik nukrus, mis läks otse südamesse ja võttis sõnad suust; see andis tema ilule täiuse.

As there was no form of government common to the peoples thus segregated, nor tie of language, history, habit or belief, they were called a Republic.

What is adolescence without trash?

We class schools, you see, into four grades: Leading School, First-rate School, Good School, and School. Frankly, said Mr Levy, School is pretty bad...

Just the place to bury a crock of gold. I should like to bury something precious, in every place I've been happy. And then when I was old, and ugly and miserable, I could come back, and dig it up, and remember.

Sebastian's life was governed by a code of such imperatives. 'I must have pillar-box red pyjamas,' 'I have to stay in bed until the sun works round the windows,' 'I've absolutely got to drink champagne tonight.

At night his most frequent recurring dream was of doing The Times crossword puzzle; his most disagreeable that he was reading a tedious book aloud to his family.

the sly, sharp instinct for self-preservation that passes for wisdom among the rich.

It (modernization) is just another jungle closing in.

He was entrancing, with that epicene beauty which in extreme youth sings aloud for love and withers at the first cold wind.

But I had no patience with this convent chatter. I had felt the brush take life in my hand that afternoon; I had had my finger in the great, succulent pie of creation. I was a man of the Renaissance that evening- of Browning's renaissance. I, who had walked the streets of Rome in Genoa velvet and had seen the stars through Galileo's tube, spurned the friars, with their dusty tomes, and their sunken, jealous eyes and their crabbed hair-splitting speech.

Oh yes, I believe that. It's a lovely idea. But you can't believe things because they're a lovely idea. But I do. That's how I believe.

Sometimes, Helena continued, I have a terrible dream of the future. Not now, but presently, people may forget their loyalty to their kings and emperors and take power for themselves. Instead of letting one victim bear this frightful curse they will take it all on themselves, each one of them. Think of the misery of a whole world possessed of Power without Grace.

There is nothing to be gained by multiplying social distinctions indefinitely.

Always wear a tall hat on Sundays during term. It is by that, more than anything, that a man is judged.' And do you know," continued my father, snuffling deeply, "I always did. Some men did, some didn't. I never saw any difference between them or heard it commented on, but I always wore mine. It only shows what effect judicious advice can have, properly delivered at the right moment.

Presently [Bridey] said: "If I was Rex"—his mind seemed full of such suppositions: "If I was Archbishop of Westminster," "If I was head of the Great Western Railway," "If I was an actress," as though it were a mere trick of fate that he was none of these things, and he might awake any morning to find the matter adjusted—"if I was Rex I should want to live in my constituency.

As my intimacy with his family grew, I became part of the world which he sought to escape; I became one of the bonds which held him.

Two wives despaired of him,' he said. 'When he got engaged to Sylvia, she made it a condition that he should take the cure at Zurich. And it worked. He came back in three months a different man. And he hasn't touched a drop since, even though Sylvia walked out on him.' 'Why did she do that?' Well, poor Charlie got rather a bore when he stopped drinking. But that's not really the point of the story.

Oh, my darling, why is it that love makes me hate the world? It's supposed to have quite the opposite effect. I feel as though all mankind, and God, too, were in a conspiracy against us.

An artist must be a reactionary. He has to stand out against the tenor of the age and not go flopping along; he must offer some little opposition.

He was fortified by a memory which kept only the good things and rejected the ill. Despite his sorrows, he had had a fair share of joys and these were ever fresh and accessible.

Thus strategists hesitate over the map, the few pins and lines of coloured chalk, contemplating a change in the pins and lines, a matter of inches, which outside the room, out of sight of the studious officers, may engulf the past, present and future in ruin or life. She was a symbol to herself then, lacking the life of both child and woman; victory and defeat were changes of pin and line; she knew nothing of war.

Every attendance at Mass leaves me without comfort or edification. I shall never, pray God, apostatize but church-going is now a bitter trial.