He promised to remove these carrots in a re-issue of the book, but they are still wrongly and redly there.

It [Lancashire Hotpot] needs very slow cooking in an oven. Into a family-sized, brown, oval-shaped dish with a lid, you place the following ingredients: best end of neck of lamb, trimmed of all fat; potatoes and onions thickly sliced. These go in alternate layers. Season well, cover with good stock, top with oysters, or, if you wish, sliced beef kidneys. There is no need for officious timing: you will know when it is done. Serve with pickled red cabbage and a cheap claret. In his novel The human factor, Mr Graham Greene has the effrontery to add carrots to the dish. He promised to remove these carrots in a re-issue of the book, but they are still wrongly and redly there.

Anthony Burgess, cited in J. Meades, The plagiarist in the kitchen (2017), 83-4

Temple Haynes pointed at pictures in turn with a stick, inviting the little men to name them

Temple Haynes pointed at pictures in turn with a stick, inviting the little men to name them. He seemed pleased to see Moneypenny. "I don't seen to getting very far with this dialect," he said. "They keep saying the same thing. They seem to give everything the same name." He read off a weird word from his notebook. "That," he said.

"Yes," said Moneypenny. "That means 'picture'."

"Why do you have more than one picture of each thing?" asked Crabbe.

"That," said Temple Haynes, "is for plurals."

A. Burgess, Beds in the East (1959), Malayan trilogy edition: 508
"

Protestantism is a disreputable young brother

My reactions are most unorthodox. I feel less hurt about your entering Islam than I would if you were to become a Protestant. That is wrong, for Protestantism is a disreputable young brother but still of the family. Whereas Islam is the old enemy.

A. Burgess, The Enemy in the Blanket (1958), Malayan trilogy edition: 244

Religion is the most dangerous thing in the world

'Exactly. Religion is the most dangerous thing in the world. It is not little girls in their communion frocks and silly holy pictures and the Children of Mary. It is,' he said, 'high explosive, dynamite, the,' he smiled at the conceit, 'splitting of the atom.'

...

'Your church,' I said, 'anticipated Carlo's reforms.'
'My church knew what it was doing,. It knew it would turn into a club for upperclass Englishmen. You may laugh at it, but it's a safe church, not like yours. It's tepid, because it knows that fire burns. It thinks fire should be imprisoned in an Adam fireplace, not held in the hand. Never despise tepidity,'

A. Burgess, Earthly Powers (1982), 345 and 629


I've paired these two, because I think they summarise Burgess' view of religion, which threatens to be true. The first is spoken by the catholic priest who later becomes pope; the latter by an English poet. This juxtaposition is as telling as the words, and it's the great glory of Anglicanism that it's almost true, but, just, not quite.

Get off Comparative Literature: it doesn't help you to cope with life

I looked at him and very nearly said: Here are you teaching comparative literature, the big subtle stuff crammed with ambiguities, and you've been put in the situation of melodrama, very simple and crude, a teenage daughter turned into an unmarried mother and a wife distraught with the shame of it, yourself a sorrowing father. Get off Comparative Literature: it doesn't help you to cope with life

A. Burgess, Earthly Powers (1980), 593

There are bad men and good men, it's as simple as that

'Divine mysteries, all nonsense,' she said. 'There are bad men and good men, it's as simple as that. Greed and malevolence face moderation and decency. Carlo always wants to bring theology into things, blame everything  on the devil.'
'That's his trade.'
'Yes, his trade. Evil's necessary to his trade. Without evil he'd have nothing to do.'

A. Burgess, Earthly Powers (1980), 300

It was the afternoon of my eighty-first birthday

It was the afternoon of my eighty-first birthday, and I was in bed with my catamite when Ali announced that the archbishop had come to see me.

A. Burgess, Earthly Powers (1980), 1