Robertson Davies Quotes - Page 8

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Canada is not really a place where you are encouraged to have large spiritual adventures.

Robertson Davies

Spiritual, Adventure, Canada

The Enthusiasms of Robertson Davies (1990)

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It is those pent-up, craving children who make all the wars and all the horrors and all the art and all the beauty and discovery in life, because they are trying to achieve what lay beyond their grasp before they were five years old.

Robertson Davies

Art, Children, War

Robertson Davies (1992). “The Cornish Trilogy”, Penguin Group USA

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In India it is regarded as a good idea to dart in front of an oncoming car, for the car is sure to kill the evil spirits who are pursuing you, and all the rest of your life you will have good luck.

Robertson Davies

Life, Good Luck, Ideas

Robertson Davies (1949). “The Table Talk of Samuel Marchbanks”, Clarke, Irwin

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I would not for a moment have you suppose that I am one of those idiots who scorns Science, merely because it is always twisting and turning, and sometimes shedding its skin, like the serpent that is [the doctors'] symbol.

Robertson Davies

Science, Doctors, Skins

Robertson Davies (2008). “Selected Works on the Pleasures of Reading”, Penguin Group Canada

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If you attack Stupidity you attack an entrenched interest with friends in government and every walk of public life.

Robertson Davies

Life, Government, Stupidity

"The Table Talk of Samuel Marchbanks". Book by Robertson Davies, 1949.

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Although I am almost illiterate mathematically, I grasped very early in life that any one who can count to ten can count upward indefinitely if he is fool enough to do so.

Robertson Davies

Math, Fool, Enough

Robertson Davies (1949). “The Table Talk of Samuel Marchbanks”, Clarke, Irwin

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Literary critics, however, frequently suffer from a curious belief that every author longs to extend the boundaries of literary art, wants to explore new dimensions of the human spirit, and if he doesn't, he should be ashamed of himself.

Robertson Davies

Art, Suffering, Want

"Somerset Maugham". 1982.

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In a government like ours, the Crown is the abiding and unshakable element in government; politicians may come and go, but the Crown remains and certain aspects of our system pertain to it which are not dependent on any political party. In this sense, the Crown is the consecrated spirit of Canada.

Robertson Davies

Party, Government, Political

Robertson Davies (1994). “Hunting Stuart and The Voice of the People”, p.7, Dundurn

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Pessimism is a very easy way out because it is a short view of life. If you look at what is happening around us today, you can't help but feel that life is a terrible complexity of problems. But if you look back a few thousand years, you realize that we have advanced fantastically. If you take a long view, I do not see how you can be pessimistic about the future of mankind.

Robertson Davies

Life, Future, Views

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Tristan and Isolde were lucky to die when they did. They'd have been sick of all that rubbish in a year.

Robertson Davies

Love, Years, Sick

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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 pleasure, and that put him in a class with filthy thinkers like Cece Athelstan.

Robertson Davies

Love, Sex, Men

Robertson Davies (1996). “Fifth business”, Penguin, 1996

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A Librettist is a mere drudge in the world of opera.

Robertson Davies

World, Opera, Mere

Robertson Davies (1999). “Happy Alchemy: On the Pleasures of Music and the Theatre”, Penguin Group USA

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He types his labored column - weary drudge! Senile fudge and solemn: spare, editor, to condemn these dry leaves of his autumn.

Robertson Davies

Autumn, Editors, Fudge

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All real fantasy is serious. Only faked fantasy is not serious. That is why it is so wrong to impose faked fantasy on children.

Robertson Davies

Children, Real, Serious

Robertson Davies (1983). “The Deptford trilogy”, Penguin Mass Market

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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

Loss, Love Is, Men

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I see Canada as a country torn between a very northern, rather extraordinary, mystical spirit which it fears and its desire to present itself to the world as a Scotch banker.

Robertson Davies

Country, Scotch, Desire

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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

Love, Spring, Believe

"Shakespeare over the Port". Book by Robertson Davies, 1960.

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To be a book-collector is to combine the worst characteristics of a dope fiend with those of a miser.

Robertson Davies

Book, Writing, Dope

Robertson Davies (1949). “The Table Talk of Samuel Marchbanks”, Clarke, Irwin

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Do not suppose, however, that I intend to urge a diet of classics on anybody. I have seen such diets at work. I have known people who have actually read all, or almost all, the guaranteed Hundred Best Books. God save us from reading nothing but the best.

Robertson Davies

Book, Reading, People

Robertson Davies (1997). “The Merry Heart: Reflections on Reading, Writing, and the World of Books”, Viking Press

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I am quite a wise old bird, but I am no desert hermit who can only prophesy when his guts are knotted with hunger. I am deep in the old man’s puzzle, trying to link the wisdom of the body with the wisdom of the spirit until the two are one.

Robertson Davies

Wise, Men, Two

Robertson Davies (1983). “The Deptford trilogy”, Penguin Mass Market

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If I had my way books would not be written in English but in an exceedingly difficult secret language.... This plan would have the advantage of scaring off all amateur authors, retired politicians, country doctors...who would not have the patience to learn the secret language.

Robertson Davies

Country, Book, Doctors

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It was as though she was an exile from a world that saw things her way

Robertson Davies

World, Way, Saws

Robertson Davies (1983). “The Deptford trilogy”, Penguin Mass Market

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Very few [doctors] are men of science in any very serious sense; they're men of technique.

Robertson Davies

Science, Men, Doctors

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Computers will have to learn that when I quote from some old author who spelled differently from the machine, the wishes of the long-dead author will have to be respected, and the machine will have to mind its manners

Robertson Davies

Long, Mind, Wish

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The little boy nodded at the peony and the peony seemed to nod back. The little boy was neat, clean and pretty. The peony was unchaste, dishevelled as peonies must be, and at the height of its beauty.(...) Every hour is filled with such moments, big with significance for someone.

Robertson Davies

Boys, Littles, Height

Robertson Davies (1992). “The Cornish Trilogy”, Penguin Group USA

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Born: August 28, 1913
Died: December 2, 1995
Occupation: Novelist
Cite this Page: Citation

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