[The satirist] must fully possess, at least in the world of the imagination, the quality the lack of which he is deriding in others. Rebecca West More Quotes by Rebecca West More Quotes From Rebecca West It seemed a good idea at the time. Rebecca West good-ideasideas the law, like art, is always vainly racing to catch up with experience. Rebecca West racinglawart There is nothing rarer than a man who can be trusted never to throw away happiness, however eagerly he sometimes grasps it. In history we are as frequently interested in our own doom. Rebecca West doomsometimesmen If the whole human race lay in one grave, the epitaph on its headstone might well be: 'It seemed like a good idea at the time.' Rebecca West racetimeideas Birds sat on the telegraph wires that spanned the river as the black notes sit on a staff of music. Rebecca West blackriversbird There is a point, and it is reached more easily than is supposed, where interference with freedom of the arts and literature becomes an attack on the life of society. Rebecca West societyliteratureart I find to my astonishment that an unhappy marriage goes on being unhappy when it is over. Rebecca West happy-marriagedivorceunhappy Because hypocrisy stinks in the nostrils one is likely to rate it as a more powerful agent for destruction than it is. Rebecca West powerfulhypocrisyhypocrite I cannot see that art is anything less than a way of making joys perpetual. Rebecca West scrapbookingjoyart It is always one's virtues and not one's vices that precipitate one into disaster. Rebecca West virtuevicessuccess The earth itself is slightly resistant to routine. Rebecca West routineearth She saw she had fallen into the hands of one of those doctors who have strayed too far from apparent in the direction of the soul. Rebecca West doctorsmedicinehands The Portrait of a Lady is entirely successful in giving one the sense of having met somebody far too radiantly good for this world. Rebecca West portraitssuccessfulgiving But just as it sometimes happens that the most temperate people, who have never acquired the habit of drinking alcohol, or even a taste for it, are tormented by the fear that somehow or other they will one day find themselves drunk, so Isabelle perpetually feared that she might be betrayed into an impulsive act that was destructive to such order as reason had imposed on life. Therefore she was forever running her faculty of analysis over in her mind with the preposterous zeal of an adolescent running a razor over his beardless chin. Rebecca West drinkingrunningorder Now different races and nationalities cherish different ideals of society that stink in each other's nostrils with an offensiveness beyond the power of any but the most monstrous private deed. Rebecca West different-nationalitiesdeedsrace If there is a God, I don't think He would demand that anyone bow down or stand up to Him. I often have a suspicion that God is still trying to work things out and hasn't finished. Rebecca West if-there-is-a-godtryingthinking Any writer worth his salt knows that only a small proportion of literature does nore than partly compensate people for the damage they have suffered in learning to read. Rebecca West literaturedoepeople I've never gone anywhere where the men have come up to my infantile expectations. I always have gone through life constantly being surprised by the extreme, marvelous qualities of a small minority of men. But I can't see the rest of them. They seem awful rubbish. Rebecca West qualityexpectationsmen There is one common condition for the lot of women in Western civilization and all other civilizations that we know about for certain, and that is, woman as a sex is disliked and persecuted, while as an individual she is liked, loved, and even, with reasonable luck, sometimes worshipped. Rebecca West womencivilizationsex I take it as a prime cause of the present confusion of society that it is too sickly and too doubtful to use pleasure frankly as a test of value. Rebecca West testsconfusionuse
