Wednesday, 17 June 2026

If I had had any intimation that the self I was going to find would turn out to be only the same self from which I had spent so much time in flight, I would have stayed at home.

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I wanted to find myself. This is an interesting phrase, not current as far as I know in the language of any other people, which certainly do...
Tuesday, 16 June 2026

You can’t stop a committee once it’s made up its mind to waste money

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‘She can’t take on the government,’ Blatt and Unwin agreed at lunchtime the next day. ‘Not when it’s in spending mood. You can’t stop a comm...
Monday, 15 June 2026

Directors realise that audiences are not likely to have much grip on Shakespeare’s King John

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Directors realise that audiences are not likely to have much grip on Shakespeare’s King John. They hardly know what to expect, except perhap...

Most of them are rubbish and do not help me understand him

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Got some of Hardy's poems out of Holborn library ... Most of them are rubbish and do not help me understand him. They make me think of h...
Sunday, 14 June 2026

Heaven might comprise eating foie gras to the sound of trumpets.

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Meanwhile, Smith's Christianity was one we might all enjoy. With God he was on good terms. God is, he wrote, best served by 'regular...

Freddie herself had fulfilled the one sure condition of being loved by the English nation, that is, she had been going on a very long time

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Freddie had no need to depend upon her friends in the theatre. Neither did she have to dread time’s encroachments. The place could hardly ge...
Saturday, 13 June 2026

Not precisely disagreeable, it suggested a church vestry where old clothes hang and flowers moulder in the sink, but respect is called for just the same

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Everyone who knew the Temple School will remember the distinctive smell of Freddie’s office. Not precisely disagreeable, it suggested a chur...