Short Story Writers From England

""What was that?" said Grandmamma, who is not really deaf, but when in a tight place likes to gain time by this harmless imposition."

""What I always wonder about Dickens," he said, "is how on earth did the man correct his proofs?" Because, as he went on to point out, between the time of writing and the time of correcting he must have thought of so many new descriptive touches, so many new creatures to add, so many new and adorable fantastic comments on life. How could he deny himself the joy of putting these in? — for there can be no pleasure like that of creation.”"

"As a child I had no doubts; but now? Take, for instance, telling the truth. I was brought up to believe that one should do that, and I knew a lie a mile off. But now I see that mendacity, or at any rate the suppression of one's real feelings and opinions, is the cement that binds society together."

""Do you think women ought to have the vote?" I asked him. "My mother says," he replied, "that all the clever women have it already." "Has she got it?" I asked. He grinned. "I should rather say she had," he answered."

"In France he would have been, I think, a sad bore, for there he would have discovered so many points of superiority to the English: but not even so keen a censor of his own country and countrymen as Mr. Dabney could find aught in Venice, except such forgivable and inimitable advantages as crumbling and picturesque architecture and clear skies, to hold up as a model for home adoption."

"I never need to see any one twice to know them. My first impressions are always right. Sometimes I go back on my first impressions, but it is always a mistake to do so."

"Have misfortune and disease and frustration and insecurity been necessary to man's ingenuity and industry? Without sorrow should we have had no telegraph? without tears, no camera? Have all the benefits of civilisation been wrung from us in some effort to escape from the blows of fate? And even if so, might not happiness, without the advantages of progress, have still been better?"

"What does matter is that in a French inn you may be as witty as you can, as intelligent as you can, but some one there will be more intelligent, more witty."

"To-day — well, my Utopia, if ever I framed one, would be a land where the laws demanded that people should be vicious. Then one would be able to count at any rate on a little virtue. If no man might live with a woman in any but an irregular union, there would be at once quite a run on honest matrimony and the Law Courts would be full of desperately wicked monogamists; while if every one was expected to steal and swindle, there would soon be an extensive criminal class who respected property."

"The French never allow a distinguished son of France to lack a statue."

"I should have remembered that black is the colour of France. Amusing that the typical figure of that country in so many people's imagination is a saucy girl with little or nothing on, whereas in reality it is an old woman in mourning."

"The man who is so painstakingly cautious about doing his own body no harm seldom does anything for anyone else."

"Human nature is rarely so amusing as when trying to get a house off its hands. Women at this task can be untruthful enough, but their untruth lacks the infusion of candour which a skilful male liar can introduce."

"The trouble is that really wanting things is so rare. It's a lukewarm world!"

"People in hotels strike no roots. The French phrase for chronic hotel guests even says so: they are called dwellers sur la branche."

"I walked back by way of the sea-lions' enclosure to refresh my eyes with the King Penguin's perfect ecclesiastical tailoring. He was pacing moodily about as usual, in what one felt to be the interval between a marriage ceremony and a funeral service. Much better, I thought, to have left the £2000 a year to him. No harm would then be done, and what perfect episcopal garden-parties he could give with it!"

""What is it like in the air?" I once asked him. "Ripping," he said. "But the sensations?” I continued. “How do you feel?" "Ripping," he said. "And what does the world look like down below as you rush along?" "Ripping," he said."

"It is possible to give wedding presents, birthday presents, and Christmas presents without any thought or affection at all: they can be ordered by post card; but the unbirthday present demands the nicest care. It is therefore the best of all, and it is the only kind to which the golden rule of present-giving imperatively applies — the golden rule which insists that you must never give to another anything that you would not rather keep for ourself, nothing that does not cost you a pang to part from."

"Some writer has described Melbourne as Glasgow, with the sky of Alexandria; and certainly the beautiful climate of Australia, so Italian in its brightness, must have a great effect on the nature of such an adaptable race as the Anglo-Saxon. In spite of the dismal prognostications of Marcus Clark regarding the future Australian, whom he describes as being "a tall, coarse, strong-jawed, greedy, pushing, talented man, excelling in swimming and horsemanship," it is more likely that he will be a cultured, indolent individual, with an intense appreciation of the arts and sciences, and a dislike to hard work and utilitarian principles. Climatic influence should be taken into account with regard to the future Australian, and our posterity will be no more like us than the luxurious Venetians resembled their hardy forefathers, who first started to build on those lonely sandy islands of the Adriatic."

"I don't like Latin," said Miss Frettlby, shaking her pretty head. "I agree with Heine's remark, that if the Romans had had to learn it they would not have found time to conquer the world."

"It was Saturday morning, and of course all fashionable Melbourne was doing the Block. With regard to its "Block," Collins Street corresponds to New York's Broadway, London's Regent Street and Rotten Row, and to the Boulevards of Paris. It is on the Block that people show off their new dresses, bow to their friends, cut their enemies, and chatter small talk."

"Young men of the present day are very fond of running down women, and think it a manly thing to sneer at them for their failings; but God help the man who, in time of trouble, has not a woman to stand by his side with cheering words and loving smiles to help him in the battle of life."

""Whatever you do, don’t go on to the beaches at dusk," was all he said. Then he vanished."

"Young men, not bein' old men," she replied, cautiously, "and sinners not bein' saints, it's not nattral as latch keys should be made for ornament instead of use, and Mr. Fitzgerald bein' one of the 'andsomest men in Melbourne, it ain't to be expected as 'e should let 'is latch key git rusty, tho', 'avin' a good moral character, 'e uses it with moderation."

"Diplomacy," said Calton, to one young aspirant for legal honours, "is the oil we cast on the troubled waters of social, professional, and political life; and if you can, by a little tact, manage mankind, you are pretty certain to get on in this world."

"Raki is bad enough, but it's nectar compared with pulque."

"I was not myself on that night. The wine was in and the wit was out."

"History was being manufactured at the rate of a sensation a week."

"Cease, ye Etonians! and no more With rival wits contend: Feathers, we know, will float in air, And bubbles will ascend."

"This pair in matrimony Go most unequal snacks: He gets all the Honey, And she gets all the whacks."

"It seems as if Nature had curiously plann'd That men's names with their trades should agree; There's Twining the Tea-man, who lives in the Strand, Would be whining, if robb'd of his T."

"When Anacreon would fight, as the poets have said, A reverse he display'd in his vapour, For while all his poems were loaded with lead, His pistols were loaded with paper. For excuses, Anacreon old custom may thank, Such a salvo he should not abuse, For the cartridge, by rule, is always made blank, That is fired away at Reviews."

"Shelley styles his new poem "Prometheus Unbound," And 'tis like to remain so while time circles round; For surely an age would be spent in the finding A reader so weak as to pay for the binding!"

"Two Miltons in separate ages were born: The cleverer Milton 'tis clear we have got, Though the other had talents the world to adorn, This lives by his mews, which the other could not!"

"Cease your humming; The case is "on"; Defendant's Cumming, Plaintiff's—gone!"

"An arch wag has declar'd, that he truly can say Why the Prince did not lay the first stone t'other day: The Restrictions prevented — the reason is clear; The Regent can't meddle in making a pier."

"I had never had a piece of toast Particularly long and wide, But fell upon the sanded floor, And always on the buttered side."

"To the truly benevolent mind, indeed, nothing is more satisfactory than to hear of a miser denying himself the necessaries of life a little too far and ridding us of his presence altogether."

"He was no coward, but it had suddenly struck him that the present was a very ill-chosen time for a row with his younger relative, however successful might be the issue. Such violence should not go unpunished, but vengeance is a dish that can be eaten cold."

"May he perish, inch by inch, within reach of the aid that shall never come, ere the God of the poor take him into his hand."

"You never really know how strong you are until being strong is your only choice."

"Love is not about finding someone to live with, it's about finding someone you can't imagine living without"

"Can we start the show?” I smiled into the mic and adjusted the headphones on my ears, slid a knob on the mixing desk down, and switched to a soft neo-soul instrumental, turning it down low."

"It was the kind of lovemaking that has you feeling more beautiful the next day; walking smugly with a sway, hips swishing, with a nimbus of power and joy around you."

"Aren’t you tired of mandem using your hearts for sport? I ask this now because I heard there’s a new player in town. And I won’t lie, he’s kind of cute too. A snack. A beverage. But you guys know that too much coffee is bad for you, right?"

"Eros pulled Psy so close to him there was no real demarcation between her heartbeat and his, and when they kissed, with Olympus beneath their feet and the sky surrounding them, Eros felt as if what they had was not just above the world as they knew it, but beyond it, out of its touch, its scope, itself a propelling energy that catapulted and vacuumed them into their own universe."

"Time was constructed with love in mind."

"The smile he gave her was mainstream, pop, radio-friendly. The smile he’d given me was the single released after an artist had established themselves, found their voice, could speak directly to their target audience. The smile he’d given me had more R&B to it."

"Wastemen are aptly called so because they waste our time. Waste our energy. On purpose. They sell us dreams and then take them away, so we end up chasing them as if it was ever a reality."

"I couldn’t believe I was letting my ex-boyfriend risk the security of my bag. Money before honeys. No. Men weren’t honeys. Scratch that. Fees before The D. Contracts before Phone Contacts. Those were all terrible and I cannot believe someone is paying me to write. I opened up Instagram to distract myself."