What harm has he ever done to you?' 'You know what harm he's done me. He offended me with his terrible taste. Nick Hornby More Quotes by Nick Hornby More Quotes From Nick Hornby I have learned things from the game. Much of my knowledge of locations in Britain and Europe comes not from school, but from away games or the sports pages, and hooliganism has given me both a taste for sociology and a degree of fieldwork experience. I have learned the value of investing time and emotion in things I cannot control, and of belonging to a community whose aspirations I share completely and uncritically. Nick Hornby europe sports school That is another chamber of my heart that shows no electrical activity - the chamber that used to flicker into life when I saw a film that moved me, or read a book that inspired me, or listened to music that made me want to cry. I closed that chamber myself, for all the usual reasons. And now I seem to have made a pact with some philistine devil: if I don't attempt to re-open it, I will be allowed just enough energy and optimism to get through a working day without wanting to hang myself. Nick Hornby optimism heart book I'm still not a very good white wine, but I'm drinkable - you could put me in a punch, anyway. Nick Hornby very-good wine white The chief attraction of the opposite sex for all of us, old and young, men and women: we need someone to save us from the sympathetic smiles in the Sunday-night cinema queue, someone who can stop us from falling down into the pit where the permanently single live with their mums and dads. Nick Hornby dad sex fall Sequels are very rarely a good idea, and in any case, the success of the book changed my relationship with the club in some ways. Nick Hornby clubs book ideas [H]ow was I supposed to get excited about the oppression of females if they couldn't be trusted to stay upright during the final minutes of a desperately close promotion campaign? Nick Hornby finals female soccer You spend Christmas at somebody's house, you worry about their operations, you give them hugs and kisses and flowers, you see them in their dressing gown...and then bang, that's it. Gone forever. And sooner or later there will be another mum, another Christmas, more varicose veins. They're all the same. Only the addresses, and the colors of the dressing gown, change. Nick Hornby kissing color flower Radio football is football reduced to its lowest common denominator. Nick Hornby radio common football my friends don't seem to be friends at all but people whose phone numbers I haven't lost. Nick Hornby phones numbers people Sometimes we have to be judged by our one-offs. Nick Hornby judged sometimes Cynicism is our shared common language, the Esperanto that actually caught on, and though I'm not fluent in it - I like too many things, and I'm not envious of enough people - I know enough to get by. Nick Hornby esperanto common people She thought I was...soulful, by which I think she means that I don't say much and I always look vaguely pissed off. Nick Hornby pissed-off mean thinking I fell in love with football as I was later to fall in love with women: suddenly, inexplicably, uncritically, giving no thought to the pain or disruption it would bring with it. Nick Hornby falling-in-love pain football I used to believe, although I don't now, that growing and growing up are analogous, that both are inevitable and uncontrollable processes. Now it seems to me that growing up is governed by the will, that one can choose to become an adult, but only at given moments. These moments come along fairly infrequently -during crises in relationships, for example, or when one has been given the chance to start afresh somewhere- and one can ignore them or seize them. Nick Hornby growing-up adults believe It takes a child to say the unsayable. Nick Hornby children It's no good looking to writers for definitions of what constitutes proper writing, because you will drive yourself crazy, and you won't find anything that you can build into a coherent whole. Nick Hornby definitions crazy writing Complaining about boring football is a little like complaining about the sad ending of King Lear: it misses the point somehow. Nick Hornby kings missing football Surely we all occasionally buy books because of a daydream we're having - a little fantasy about the people we might turn into one day, when our lives are different, quieter, more introspective, and when all the urgent reading, whatever that might be, has been done. We never arrive at that point, needless to say. Nick Hornby reading book people You can wait forever for the muse to sit on your shoulder, but most of the time you know what has to be done and inspiration is not going to help you. Nick Hornby inspiration waiting forever By the early seventies I had become an Englishman - that is to say, I hated England just as much as half my compatriots seemed to do. Nick Hornby hated england half
