Sometimes I wore a fringe so deep it obscured the way ahead. This hardly mattered. There were always others to look where I was going.
The distinction between indoors and outdoors, which in England is usually so marked, was temporarily suspended in a hot gauzy haze.
What is privacy if not for invading?
There can be no such thing as “philosophical horror”, at least as a premeditated genre. Why? Because philosophy implies enquiry, reflection and an open mind, whereas the genre of horror demands certain conclusions in advance.
To find something truly alive these days is in itself almost shocking – as shocking as a living doll.
The famous atheist Christopher Hitchens once declared that ‘You’re expelled from your mother’s uterus as if shot from a cannon, towards a barn door studded with old nail files and rusty hooks.’ Presumably that was what he had in mind when conceiving his three children.
It was not so much that I longed for death as that I didn’t long for life.
Mr Melly had to be obscene to be believed.
A clown is a horrible thing to happen to anyone.
The monasteries of Bohemia demand more of their brotherhood than some are prepared to give. The daily routine of back-breaking idleness proves too much for certain novices. The self-inflicted orgies that are the inevitable punishment for the slightest deviation into the bourgeois way of life are more than their frail flesh can stand. Many discover to their shame that they have scruples; they have roots, and greatest disadvantage of all, they have hope.
You first have to find who you are. Then, you have to be it like mad.
I don’t have any pets. I’ve got enough dumb friends without them.
If there were no applause and no criticism, who would you be?
It is hard enough to share wealth without being involved in undignified scenes; shared poverty consists of nothing else.
It was my policy never to spend more than half my wages so as not to have to work for more than half my days on earth.
Among other objections to the image of me was that I hated animals. I still do. I have enough dumb friends without them.
I did not know that a reputation for wit is earned not by making jokes, but by laughing at the pleasantries of others.
The place where no harm can come is the place where nothing at all can come.
I played all games seriously, even nastily. They provided me an enclosed world whose triumphs compensated me somewhat for a life of defeat elsewhere.
The increased scale of your operations will lend you respectability.