Alan Bennett quotes - page 2

Sometimes there is no next time, no time-outs, no second chances. Sometimes it's now or never. (Alan Bennett)
History is a commentary on the various and continuing incapabilities of men. What is history? History is women following behind with the bucket.
Alan Bennett
I saw someone peeing in Jermym Street the other day. I thought, is this the end of civilization as we know it? Or is it simply someone peeing in Jermyn Street?
Alan Bennett
Life is generally something that happens elsewhere.
Alan Bennett
What she was finding also was how one book led to another, doors kept opening wherever she turned and the days weren't long enough for the reading she wanted to do.
Alan Bennett
It's subjunctive history. You know, the subjunctive? The mood used when something may or may not have happened. When it is imagined.
Alan Bennett
Above literature?' said the Queen. 'Who is above literature? You might as well say one was above humanity.
Alan Bennett
Life is like a box of sardines and we are all looking for the key.
Alan Bennett
Clichés can be quite fun. That's how they got to be clichés.
Alan Bennett
Were we closer to the ground as children, or is the grass emptier now?
Alan Bennett
[B]riefing is not reading. In fact it is the antithesis of reading. Briefing is terse, factual and to the point. Reading is untidy, discursive and perpetually inviting. Briefing closes down a subject, reading opens it up. (Alan Bennett)
Your whole life is on the other side of the glass. And there is nobody watching.
Alan Bennett
Reading is untidy, discursive and perpetually inviting.
Alan Bennett
Children always assume the sexual lives of their parents come to a grinding halt at their conception.
Alan Bennett
My films are about embarrassment.
Alan Bennett
We were put to Dickens as children but it never quite took. That unremitting humanity soon had me cheesed off.
Alan Bennett
Cancer, like any other illness, is a bore.
Alan Bennett
Those who have known the famous are publicly debriefed of their memories, knowing as their own dusk falls that they will only be remembered for remembering someone else.
Alan Bennett
Cloisters, ancient libraries ... I was confusing learning with the smell of cold stone.
Alan Bennett
One of the hardest things for boys to learn is that a teacher is human. One of the hardest things for a teacher to learn is not to try and tell them.
Alan Bennett
We were all miners in our family. My father was a miner. My mother is a miner. These are miner's hands, but we were all artists, I suppose, really. But I was the first one who had the urge to express myself on paper rather than at the coalface. (Alan Bennett)
Closing a public library is child abuse, really, because it hinders child development.
Alan Bennett
The bits I most remember about my school days are those that took place outside the classroom, as we were taken on countless theatre visits and trips to places of interest.
Alan Bennett
Teachers need to feel they are trusted. They must be allowed some leeway to use their imagination; otherwise, teaching loses all sense of wonder and excitement.
Alan Bennett
... Once I start a book I finish it. That was the way one was brought up. Books, bread and butter, mashed potato - one finishes what's on one's plate. That's always been my philosophy.
Alan Bennett