I once asked him, in Annie's Bar, what sort of whisky he liked. 'Large ones'

He did not aspire to the Tory beau monde. He was solidly bourgeois and highly intelligent. He liked good wine, whisky and Havana cigars. He was not, however, at all fussy. I once asked him, in Annie's Bar, what sort of whisky he liked. 'Large ones,'

Alan Watkins, cited in D. Sandbrook, Never had it so good (2005), 514

In closer possession of religious truths than the Pope himself

The reference to the Holy Father was not, actually, very opportune: Carolina was one of those Catholics who consider themselves to be in closer possession of religious truths than the Pope himself; and a few moderate declarations of Pius X, the abolition of some secondary feast days in particular, had already exasperated her."This Pope would do better to mind his own business." Then she began to wonder if she hand't gone too far, crossed herself and muttered a Gloria Patri. 

G. Tomasi di Lampedusa, The Leopard (1958), tr. A. Colquhon (1961), 176

A man of forty-five can consider himself still young till the moment comes when he realises that he has children old enough to fall in love

A man of forty-five can consider himself still young till the moment comes when he realises that he has children old enough to fall in love. The Prince felt old age come over him in one blow

G. Tomasi di Lampedusa, The Leopard (1958), tr. A. Colquhon (1961), 47

Aww, mate, I just shuffle up and go wang

When asked to describe his bowling action, Jeff Thomson replied in typically laconic fashion: "Aww, mate, I just shuffle up and go wang." it was the perfect description of what he did, except it failed to reveal the carnage resulting from a simple "wang".

I. Chappell, 'Never a cricketer of the year: Jeff Thomson', S. Berry (ed.), Wisden Cricketers' Almanack (2008), 115

Tastes like sugared rainwater caught down a chimney

Episcopacy is a good thing; but it may be happen that a bishop is not a good thing. Just as brandy is a good thing, though this particular bottle is British, and tastes like sugared rainwater caught down a chimney.

G. Eliot, Scenes of clerical life (1858), 206
From 2010.

When I’m gone I don’t want any of these two-faced bastards who I didn’t get on with standing up and saying nice things about me

Fred mellowed in old age, but only in the sense that he was prepared to forgive and forget on a selective basis. Making it up with Geoffrey Boycott after both men fell out during one of Yorkshire’s civil wars was well-met. But on other deeper disputes he was implacable. He left the room and never returned. After he died, we expected a memorial service. It was not to be, and on his express orders. His final instructions were: “When I’m gone I don’t want any of these two-faced bastards who I didn’t get on with standing up and saying nice things about me.”

M. Parkinson, 'Bloody-minded, beautiful, t'best', M. Engel (ed.), Wisden Cricketers' Almanack (2007), 46

To my amusement at least, this article appeared in The Times with the headline
A working class hero who only wanted to be an entertainer. I know which one I prefer.

If you have grandchildren, take them

The Oval, Southampton, Canterbury, Edgbaston, Arundel, Chester-le-Street, Old Trafford, Worcester, Headingley.  These are the grounds where (subject to fitness etc), Shane Warne is due to bowl for Hampshire in  first class-cricket in 2007. If you have grandchildren, take them, if you don't, go anyway - so you can tell them.

M. Engel, 'Notes by the editor', id. (ed.), Wisden Cricketers' Almanack (2007), 26

I took my parents.

For over twenty-five centuries we’ve been bearing the weight of superb and heterogeneous civilisations

We Sicilians have become accustomed, by long, a very long hegemony of rulers who were not of our religion and did not speak our language, to split hairs. If we had not done so we’d never have coped with the Byzantine tax gatherers, with Berber Emirs, with Spanish Viceroys. Now the bent is endemic, we’re made like that. I said ‘support’, I did not say ‘participate’. 

... 

In Sicily it doesn‘t matter about doing things well or badly; the sin which we Sicilians never forgive is simply that of ‘doing’ at all. We are old, Chevalley, very old. For over twenty-five centuries we’ve been bearing the weight of superb and heterogeneous civilisations, all from outside, none made by ourselves, none that we could call own own. We’re as white as you are, Chevalley, and as the queen of England; and yet for two thousand five hundred years we’ve been a colony. I don’t say that in complaint; it’s our fault. But even so we’re worn our and exhausted.’

G. Tomasi di Lampedusa, The Leopard (1958), tr. A. Colquhon (1961),122

One had to read the books of second-rate novelists to have an authentic picture of an epoch

Elsewhere he (Lampedusa) argued that history could not be understood properly without a knowledge of literature, especially minor literature. To find out what shopkeepers and railway workers were thinking in the 1920s, he remarked, there was not point reading the works of Giovanni Gentile. One had to read the books of second-rate novelists to have an authentic picture of an epoch, and although this might require patience, a strong stomach and a dose of bad taste, it was worth it. 'Ungrammatical, illogical, hysterical, ignorant, fatuous, "snobbish", in short pitiful as they are, they give us the true portrait of Demos, our lord and master. One has to read them.

D. Gilmour, The last leopard (1988, revised edition 2007), 46

If the latter [religion] is truly opium for the masses, cricket remains purely its marijuana

Cricket is like religion, it is said of the subcontinent, and of India in particular. For India's neighbour, though, the analogy assumes a deeper, more convoluted significance. In Pakistan, cricket is not really like a religion. If the latter is truly opium for the masses, cricket remains purely its marijuana: teasingly recreational, and definite not as all-consuming.

O. Samiuddin, 'With Allah on their side', M. Engel (ed.), Wisden Cricketers' Almanack (2006), 44

[The BBC] was being semi-seriously bracketed with 'Parliament, Monarchy, Church and the Holy Ghost

The BBC was not merely a national institution but a powerful and definitive expression of national will and character. ... With guaranteed funding from a mandatory licence fee, and privileged access to a captive market, it enjoyed resources and opportunities unmatched anywhere else in the world, and within a few years it was being semi-seriously bracketed with 'Parliament, Monarchy, Church and the Holy Ghost.' By the end of the Second World War, it had become 'an additional established church, a source of authority over the language, an arbiter of national taste, a national musical impresario and a re-invigorator of national drama and song.

D. Sandbrook, Never had it so good (2005), 379

I said, 'Are these people ready for self-government?' And he said , 'No, of course not.'

Many officials thought the pace of change was too fast, but acknowledged that they simply had no choice, as Macmillan discovered when he talked to the Governor-General of Nigeria [James Robertson]:

I said, 'Are these people ready for self-government?' And he said , 'No, of course not.'

I said, 'When will they be ready?' He said, 'Twenty years, twenty-five years.'

Then I said, 'What do you recommend me to do?' He said, 'I recommend you give it to them at once.'

D. Sandbrook, Never had it so good (2005), 289

The fuller quote, which is here, is thoughtful on why, though of course is of its time.

Year after year, the wonderful folks at the ICC assemble the world's best players and get them to play bad cricket

Year after year, the wonderful folks at the ICC assemble the world's best players and get them to play bad cricket. If they staged W.G.'s XI v The Don's XI at the Elysian Oval with S.F. Barnes bowling to victor Trumper, they would find some way of making the occasion dismal. It's a gift real: a kind of anti-showmanship.

M. Engel, 'Notes by the editor', id. (ed.), Wisden Cricketers' Almanack (2006), 17

Very recently this country spent a great deal of blood and treasure rescuing four of 'em from attacks by the other two

in 1967, when old and frail, Attlee was asked to address a group of anti-European Labour backbenchers, and obliged with a characteristically terse speech that captured the sentiments of many of his fellow citizens: 'The Common Market.The so-called Common Market of six nations. Know them all well. Very recently this country spent a great deal of blood and treasure rescuing four of 'em from attacks by the other two.'

D. Sandbrook, Never had it so good (2005), 220

The people of Woodford felt they belonged to a friendly, helpful community almost as unanimously as the people of Bethnal Green

Wilmott and Young expected to fund that the 'warmth and friendliness' that they had found in Bethnal Green had no equivalent in a middle-class commuter suburb, where the people were supposed to be frustrated, selfish  and lonely. But what they discovered was precisely the opposite. 'People in the suburb', they concluded, 'are on the whole friendly, neighbourly and helpful to each other. They attend churches and clubs together, they like (or at any rate profess to like) their follow-residents. ... [']The people of Woodford felt they belonged to a friendly, helpful community almost as unanimously as the people of Bethnal Green.'

D. Sandbrook, Never had it so good (2005), 125

It was the party of Empire, the King and the flag, and that was good enough for him

Powell was a man of almost obsessive passions, from Housman and Nietzsche to High Anglicanism and hunting. He was, in short, a nineteenth-century romantic, zealous and uncompromising, a man of causes. His decision to join the Conservative Party, for example, was based less on social and economic principles than on sheer romantic traditionalism. It was the party of Empire, the King and the flag, and that was good enough for him. 

D. Sandbrook, Never had it so good (2005), 85

By January 1958, the entire government comprised some eight-five ministers, of whom thirty-five were related to Macmillan by marriage

This was largely overshadowed, however, by the fact that the Cabinet itself had a very narrow social base. Of the sixteen members in January 1957, six had been at Eton, only two had not attended a major public school, and, as usual, there were no women at all. Even more remarkably, the government as a whole was crammed to the seams with Macmillan's own relatives. By January 1958, the entire government comprised some eight-five ministers, of whom thirty-five were related to Macmillan by marriage, including seven of the nineteen members of the cabinet.

D. Sandbrook, Never had it so good (2005), 78

Not while I'm alive he ain't

Unfortunately for Bevan, many of his own party colleagues detested him. Told that Bevan was his own worst enemy, the powerful trade unionist and Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin commented: 'Not while I'm alive he ain't.' Herbert Morrison called him 'wicked', and Hugh Dalton wrote of his making 'a violent speech, of nauseating egoism and sweating with hatred'.

D. Sandbrook, Never had it so good (2005), 55-56

That does not sound much like Prussia

'Politics are the last thing we need. This at least I learned with the brethren at Neudietendorf. The state should be one family bound by love.'
'That does not sound much like Prussia,' said the Kreisamtmann.

P. Fitzgerald, The blue flower (1995), 76