Sylvia Townsend Warner Quotes

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Age Cats Children Conscience Eyes Pleasure Writing

To think of losing is to lose already.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Thinking, Losing, Loses

Sylvia Townsend Warner, William Maxwell (1982). “Letters”

44 Copy quote
It is best as one grows older to strip oneself of possessions, to shed oneself downward like a tree, to be almost wholly earth before one dies.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Tree, Earth, Possession

Sylvia Townsend Warner (1978). “Lolly Willowes: or, The loving huntsman”, Charles River Books

41 Copy quote
The fatal flaw of gravity; when you are down, everything falls down on you.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Fall, Flaws, Gravity

18 Copy quote
Truth has beauty, power, and necessity.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Truth

9 Copy quote
When I die, I hope to think I have annoyed a great many people.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Thinking, People, Annoyed

Sylvia Townsend Warner, Claire Harman (1994). “The diaries of Sylvia Townsend Warner”, Virago Pr

4 Copy quote
There is a period in one's life - perhaps not longer than six months - when one lives in two worlds at once ... It is the time when one has freshly learned to read. The Word, till then a denominating aspect of the Thing, has suddenly become detached from it and is perceived as a glittering entity, transparent and unseizable as a jellyfish, yet able to create an independent world that is both more recondite and more instantaneously convincing than the world one knew before.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Reading, Independent, Two

51 Copy quote
Slowly, with a look of intense concentration, he got up and advanced on me ... put out a front paw, and stroked my cheek as I used to stoke his chops. A human caress from a cat. I felt very meagre and ill-educated that I could not purr.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Cat, Looks, Paws

11 Copy quote
Happy is the day whose history is not written down.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Written

Sylvia Townsend Warner, Claire Harman (1994). “The diaries of Sylvia Townsend Warner”, Virago Pr

3 Copy quote
One cannot overestimate the power of a good rancorous hatred on the part of the stupid. The stupid have so much more industry and energy to expend on hating. They build it up like coral insects.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Hate, Stupid, Hatred

Sylvia Townsend Warner, Claire Harman (1994). “The diaries of Sylvia Townsend Warner”, Virago Pr

11 Copy quote
Total grief is like a minefield. No knowing when one will touch the tripwire.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Love, Grief, Knowing

Sylvia Townsend Warner, Claire Harman (1994). “The diaries of Sylvia Townsend Warner”, Virago Pr

4 Copy quote
Anticipation of pleasure is a pleasure in itself.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Expectations, Anticipation, Pleasure

4 Copy quote
noise is a pollution.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Noise, Pollution

Sylvia Townsend Warner, Claire Harman (1994). “The diaries of Sylvia Townsend Warner”, Virago Pr

3 Copy quote
Nine people out of ten (in Germany and England, perhaps ten people) would rather wait for their rights than fight for their rights.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Change, Fighting, Rights

5 Copy quote
once, when I was a young lady and on a night express ... I was awakened by a man coming in from the corridor and taking hold of my leg ... Quite as much to my own astonishment as his, I uttered the most appalling growl that ever came out of a tigress. He fled, poor man, without a word: and I lay there, trembling slightly, not at my escape but at my potentialities.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Confidence, Night, Men

9 Copy quote
Idleness is righteous if it is comfortable. Uncomfortable idleness is sin & sinful waste.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Leisure, Waste, Sin

Sylvia Townsend Warner, Claire Harman (1994). “The diaries of Sylvia Townsend Warner”, Virago Pr

6 Copy quote
And another day is tucked under my wing.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Night, Wings, Another Day

Sylvia Townsend Warner, Claire Harman (1994). “The diaries of Sylvia Townsend Warner”, Virago Pr

5 Copy quote
Happiness is an immunity.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Happiness, Immunity

Sylvia Townsend Warner (1988). “Selected stories of Sylvia Townsend Warner”, Vintage

3 Copy quote
The night was at her disposal. She might walk back to Great Mop and arrive very late; or she might sleep out and not trouble to arrive till to-morrow. Whichever she did Mrs Leak would not mind. That was one of the advantages of dealing with witches; they do not mind if you are a little odd in your ways, frown if you are late for meals, fret if you are out all night, pry and commiserate when at length you return. Lovely to be with people who prefer their thoughts to yours, lovely to live at your own sweet will, lovely to sleep out all night!

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Love, Sweet, Sleep

Sylvia Townsend Warner (1978). “Lolly Willowes: or, The loving huntsman”, Charles River Books

6 Copy quote
I wish I could write librettos for the rest of my life. It is the purest of human pleasures, a heavenly hermaphroditism of being both writer and musician. No wonder that selfish beast Wagner kept it all to himself.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Music, Selfish, Writing

Sylvia Townsend Warner, William Maxwell (1982). “Letters”

9 Copy quote
There is a moral, of course, and like all morals it is better not pursued.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Moral, Courses, Pursued

5 Copy quote
I wasn't educated. I was very lucky.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Lucky, Educated

Sylvia Townsend Warner, Claire Harman (1982). “Collected poems”, Carcanet New Press ; New York : Viking Press

3 Copy quote
Love is the only real patriation, and without one's dear one sits in a dreary and boring exile.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Real, Love Is, Dear Ones

Sylvia Townsend Warner, Valentine Ackland, Susanna Pinney (1998). “I'll stand by you: selected letters of Sylvia Townsend Warner and Valentine Ackland : with narrative by Sylvia Townsend Warner”, Random House (UK)

5 Copy quote
Young people are careless of their virginity; one day they may have it and the next not.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

People, One Day, May

5 Copy quote
A story demanded to be written, and that is why I have not answered your letter before: a wrong-headed story, that would come blundering like a moth on my window, and stare in with small red eyes, and I the last writer in the world to manage such a subject. One should have more self-control. One should be able to say, Go away. You have come to the wrong inkstand, there is nothing for you here. But I am so weakminded that I cannot even say, Come next week.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Eye, Self, Next Week

Sylvia Townsend Warner, William Maxwell (1982). “Letters”

3 Copy quote
She was heavier than he expected - women always are.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Expected

3 Copy quote

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Born: December 6, 1893
Died: May 1, 1978
Occupation: Novelist
Cite this Page: Citation

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