13 quotes
There are few who would not rather be taken in adultery than in provincialism.
Antic Hay (1923)
Shearwater sighed profoundly, like a whale in the night.
Antic Hay (1923)
“I am interested in everything,” interrupted Gumbril Junior.
“Which comes to the same thing,” said his father parenthetically, “as being interested in nothing.”
Antic Hay (1923)
Children — that would be the most desperate experiment of all. The most desperate, and perhaps the only one having any chance of being successful.
Antic Hay (1923)
Christlike in my behaviour,
Like every good believer,
I imitate the Saviour,
And cultivate a beaver.
Antic Hay (1923)
He was wondering how any one could talk so loud, could boast so extravagantly. It was as though the man had to shout in order to convince himself of his own existence.
Antic Hay (1923)
“I wish they’d hurry up with the second scene,” said Mrs. Viveash. “If there’s anything that bores me, it’s entr’actes.”
“Most of one's life is an entr’acte,” said Gumbril.
Antic Hay (1923)
Grief doesn't kill, love doesn't kill; but time kills everything, kills desire, kills sorrow, kills in the end the mind that feels them; wrinkels and softens the body while it still lives, tots it like a medlar, kills it too at last.
Antic Hay (1923)
No amount of profit-sharing or self-government by the workers, no amount of hygienic conditions or cocoa villages or recreation grounds can get rid of the fundamental slavery — the necessity of working.
Antic Hay (1923)
“Beetles, black beetles” — his father had a really passionate feeling about the clergy. Mumbojumbery was another of his favourite words. An atheist and an anti-clerical of the strict old school he was.
Antic Hay (1923)
Perhaps it's good for one to suffer. ... Can an artist do anything if he's happy? Would he ever want to do anything? What is art, after all, but a protest against the horrible inclemency of life?
Antic Hay (1923)
Many seeds had fallen in the stony places of his spirit, to spring luxuriantly up into stalky plants and wither again because they had no deepness of earth; many had been sown there and had died, since his mother scattered the seeds of the wild flowers.
Antic Hay (1923)
Political liberty’s a swindle because a man doesn’t spend his time being political. He spends it sleeping, eating, amusing himself a little and working — mostly working. When they’d got all the political liberty they wanted — or found they didn’t want — they began to understand this.
Antic Hay (1923)