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Quentin Crisp Quotes

1908–1999 England

Quentin Crisp (born Denis Charles Pratt, December 25, 1908 – November 21, 1999) was an English writer, raconteur, artist's model, and actor who was known for his memorable and insightful witticisms. He became a gay icon in the 1970s after publication of his memoir, The Naked Civil Servant (1968), brought to the attention of the general public his defiant exhibitionism and longstanding refusal to conceal his homosexuality.

England
Actors
Memoirists
Models

Also known as: Crisp, Quentin

Random Quentin Crisp quote

49 quotes

Life was a funny thing that happened to me on the way to the grave.

The Naked Civil Servant (1968)

I take it to be axiomatic that people are revolted by witnessing the shameless gratification of an appetite they do not share.

The Naked Civil Servant (1968)

Mass-murderers are simply people who have had ENOUGH.

The Naked Civil Servant (1968)

I acquiesced in this on the grounds that the most anyone can expect from a holiday is a change of agony.

The Naked Civil Servant (1968)

As someone remarked, when told the new atomic bombs would explode without a bang, "they can’t leave anything alone."

The Naked Civil Servant (1968)

An autobiography is obituary in serial form with the last installment missing.

The Naked Civil Servant (1968)

The distinction between indoors and outdoors, which in England is usually so marked, was temporarily suspended in a hot gauzy haze.

The Naked Civil Servant (1968)

Health consists of having the same diseases as one’s neighbours.

The Naked Civil Servant (1968)

If I have any talent at all, it is not for doing but for being.

The Naked Civil Servant (1968)

I became one of the stately homos of England.

The Naked Civil Servant (1968)

The young always have the same problem — how to rebel and conform at the same time. They have now solved this problem by defying their elders and copying each other.

The Naked Civil Servant (1968)

An autobiography is an obituary in serial form with the last installment missing.

The Naked Civil Servant (1968)

Michelangelo worked from within. He described not the excitements of touching or seeing a man but the excitement of being Man.

The Naked Civil Servant (1968)

Even hooligans marry, though they know that marriage is for a little while. It is alimony that is for ever.

The Naked Civil Servant (1968)

Exhibitionism is like a drug. Hooked in adolescence I was now taking doses so massive they would have killed a novice.

The Naked Civil Servant (1968)

God, from whose territory I had withdrawn my ambassadors at the age of fourteen. It had become obvious that he was never going to do a thing I said.

The Naked Civil Servant (1968)

All liaisons between homosexuals are conducted as though they were between a chorus girl and a bishop. In some cases both parties think they are bishops.

The Naked Civil Servant (1968)

When stripped, I looked less like "Il David" than a plucked chicken that died of myxomatosis.

The Naked Civil Servant (1968)

The low dive had set a standard that only middle-aged hooligans could remember and to which they looked back as Mrs Lot at Sodom.

The Naked Civil Servant (1968)

Bit by bit, I was becoming the almost acceptable face of homosexuality.

How to Become a Virgin (1981)

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Quentin Crisp (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.