English En
  • Deutsche De
  • English En
  • Français Fr
  • Русский Ru

We use cookies to personalise content and ads, to provide social media features and to analyse our traffic. We also share information about your use of our site with our marketing and analytics partners who may combine it with other information you've provided to them or which they've separately collected from you. You also may to see our Privacy Policy. By clicking the OK button below, you accept our cookies.

Authors:
Robertson Davies Quotes

Robertson Davies quotes

Canadian Novelist, Writer August 28, 1913 – December 2, 1995

Robertson Davies quotes in french
Robertson Davies quotes in russian
 Cite this Page: Citation

Quotes

What really shapes and conditions and makes us is somebody only a few of us ever have the courage to face: and that is the child you once were, long before formal education ever got its claws into you - that impatient, all-demanding child who wants love and power and can't get enough of either and who goes on raging and weeping in your spirit till at last your eyes are closed and all the fools say, 'Doesn't he look peaceful?' It is those pent-up, craving children who make all the wars and all... Robertson Davies
That was what stuck in the craws of all the good women of Deptford: Mrs Dempster had not been raped, as a decent woman would have been—no, she had yielded because a man wanted her. The subject was not one that could be freely discussed even among intimates, but it was understood without saying that if women began to yield for such reasons as that, marriage and society would not last long. Any man who spoke up for Mrs Dempster probably believed in Free Love. Certainly he associated sex with... Robertson Davies
The women we really love are the women who complete us, who have the qualities we can borrow and so become something nearer to whole men. Just as we complete them, of course; it’s not a one-way thing. Leola and I, when romance was stripped away, were too much alike; our strengths and weaknesses were too nearly the same. Together we would have doubled our gains and our losses, but that isn’t what love is. Robertson Davies
The clerisy are those who read for pleasure, but not for idleness; who read for pastime but not to kill time; who love books, but do not live by books. Robertson Davies
The greatest gift that Oxford gives her sons is, I truly believe, a genial irreverence toward learning, and from that irreverence love may spring. Robertson Davies
No need to go into details about what I said to Judy? I am no poet, and I suppose what I said was very much what everybody always says, and although I remember her as speaking golden words, I cannot recall precisely anything she said. If love is to be watched and listened to without embarrassment, it must be transmuted into art, and I don't know how to do that, and it is not what I have come to Zrich to learn. Robertson Davies
The people of the United States, perhaps more than any other nation in history, love to abase themselves and proclaim their unworthiness, and seem to find refreshment in doing so... That is a dark frivolity, but still frivolity. Robertson Davies
Robertson Davies quote: "Love affairs are for emotional sprinters; the pleasures of..."
Love affairs are for emotional sprinters; the pleasures of love are for the emotional marathoners. Robertson Davies
Robertson Davies quote: "I never heard of anyone who was really literate or who ever..."
I never heard of anyone who was really literate or who ever really loved books who wanted to suppress any of them. Robertson Davies
Robertson Davies quote: "The love of truth lies at the root of much humor."
The love of truth lies at the root of much humor. Robertson Davies
Robertson Davies quote: "If we seek the pleasures of love, passion should be..."
If we seek the pleasures of love, passion should be occasional, and common sense continual. Robertson Davies
Robertson Davies quote: "A happy childhood has spoiled many a promising life."
A happy childhood has spoiled many a promising life. Robertson Davies
Happiness is always a by-product. It is probably a matter of temperament, and for anything I know it may be glandular. But it is not something that can be demanded from life, and if you are not happy you had better stop worrying about it and see what treasures you can pluck from your own brand of unhappiness. Robertson Davies
Who's Mrs. Gummidge?' 'If you're a good girl and get well soon I'll lend you the book.' 'Oh, somebody in a book! All you people like Nilla and the Cornishes and that man Darcourt seem to live out of books. As if everything was in books!' 'Well, Schnak, just about everything is in books. No, that's wrong. We recognize in books what we've met in life. But if you'd read a few books you wouldn't have to meet everything as if it had never happened before, and take every blow right on the chin.... Robertson Davies
Education is a great shield against experience. It offers so much, ready-made and all from the best shops, that there's a temptation to miss your own life in pursuing the life of your betters. Robertson Davies

Popular Author

Related Authors