the slight sense of degeneracy induced by reading novels before luncheon Elizabeth Bowen More Quotes by Elizabeth Bowen More Quotes From Elizabeth Bowen very young people are true but not resounding instruments. Elizabeth Bowen instrumentsyouthpeople A Bowen, in the first place, made Bowen's Court. Since then, with a rather alarming sureness, Bowen's Court has made all the succeeding Bowens. Elizabeth Bowen succeedhomefirsts When one is a child, the disposition of objects, tables and chairs and doors, seems part of the natural order: a house-move lets in chaos - as it does for a dog. Elizabeth Bowen dogchildrenmoving Sacrificers ... are not the ones to pity. The ones to pity are those that they sacrifice. Oh, the sacrificers, they get it both ways. A person knows themselves that they're able to do without. Elizabeth Bowen sacrificeableway Forgiveness should be an act, but this is a state with him. Elizabeth Bowen forgivenessstatesshould One can suffer a convulsion of one's entire nature, and, unless it makes some noise, no one notices. It's not just that we are incurious; we completely lack any sense of each other's existences. Elizabeth Bowen indifferencesufferingnoise Curiosity in Rome is a form of courtesy. Elizabeth Bowen courtesyromecuriosity For people who live on expectations, to face up to their realization is something of an ordeal. Elizabeth Bowen realizationexpectationspeople Education is not so important as people think. Elizabeth Bowen importantpeoplethinking But surely love wouldn't get so much talked about if there were not something in it? Elizabeth Bowen ifslove All good dialogue perhaps deals with something unprecedented. Elizabeth Bowen dealsdialoguewriting Short of a small range of physical acts-a fight, murder, lovemaking-dialogue is the most vigorous and visible inter-action of which characters in a novel are capable. Speech is what characters do to each other. Elizabeth Bowen fightingwritingcharacter Dialogue is the ideal means of showing what is between the characters. It crystallizes relationships. It should, ideally, be so effective as to make analysis or explanation of the relationships between the characters unnecessary. Elizabeth Bowen writingcharactermean But to be quite oneself one must first waste a little time. Elizabeth Bowen wastelittlesfirsts The Irish landowner, partly from laziness but also from an indifferent delicacy, does not interfere in the lives of the people round. Sport and death are the two great socializing factors in Ireland, but these cannot operate the whole time: on the whole, the landowner leaves his tenants and work-people to make their own mistakes, while he makes his. Elizabeth Bowen mistakesportstwo The innocent are so few that two of them seldom meet - when they do meet, their victims lie strewn all round. Elizabeth Bowen literaturetwolying On the subject of dress almost no one, for one or another reason, feels truly indifferent: if their own clothes do not concern them, somebody else's do. Elizabeth Bowen clothesreasondresses Dialogue should show the relationships among people. Elizabeth Bowen shouldwritingpeople The heart may think it knows better: the senses know that absence blots people out. We really have no absent friends. The friend becomes a traitor by breaking, however unwillingly or sadly, out of our own zone: a hard judgment is passed on him, for all the pleas of the heart. Elizabeth Bowen heartpeoplethinking Sport and death are the two great socializing factors in Ireland. Elizabeth Bowen irelandsportstwo
