E. F. Benson quotes

E. F. Benson was a British novelist, biographer, and short story writer, famous for his comic Mapp and Lucia series. His works reflect a keen wit and a sharp observation of English society. He is remembered as a master of social satire and supernatural fiction. Here are 12 of his quotes:

Vermouth always makes me brilliant unless it makes me idiotic, but we'll hope for the best.

E. F. Benson

Emotionally, I have no picture-book illustrated with memories of my first five years, but externally, I have impressions that possess a haunting vividness comparable only to the texture of dreams, when dreams are tumultuously alive.

E. F. Benson

Young gentlemen with literary aspirations usually start a new university magazine, which for wit and pungency is designed to eclipse all such previous efforts, and I was no exception in the matter of this popular gambit.

E. F. Benson

Early impressions are like glimpses seen through the window by night when lightning is about.

E. F. Benson

Rightly or wrongly, the Victorian considered that there were certain subjects which were not meet for inter-sexual discussion, just as they held that certain processes of the feminine toilet, like the powdering of the nose and the application of lipstick to the mouth, were (if done at all) better done in private.

E. F. Benson

THOUGH the sun was hot on this July morning Mrs Lucas preferred to cover the half-mile that lay between the station and her house on her own brisk feet, and sent on her maid and her luggage in the fly that her husband had ordered to meet her.

E. F. Benson

There's many things in this world that will depress you, and make you good for nothing, if you take them seriously, and that cheer you up if you don't.

E. F. Benson

Queen Victoria was a woman of peerless common sense; her common sense, which is a rare gift at any time, amounted to genius. She had been brought up by her mother with the utmost simplicity, and she retained it to the end, and conducted her public and private life alike by that infallible guide.

E. F. Benson

Romance is a bird that will not sing in every bush, and love-affairs, however devoted the sentiments that inspire them, are often so business-like in the prudence with which they are conducted, that romance is reduced to a mere croaking or a disgusted silence.

E. F. Benson

...vicinity to the sea is desirable, because it is easier to do nothing by the sea than anywhere else, and because bathing and basking on the shore cannot be considered an employment but only an apotheosis of loafing. ("Expiation")

E. F. Benson