Anthony Burgess Quotes - Page 2

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• But what I do I do because I like to do.

  Anthony Burgess

  Anthony Burgess (2012). “A Clockwork Orange (Restored Text)”, p.46, W. W. Norton & Company

  9 Copy quote

• The purpose of education is to fit us for life in a civilised community, and it seems to follow from the subjects we study that the two most important things in civilised life are Art and Science.

  Anthony Burgess

  Education, Art, Two

  "English Literature: A Survey for Students". Book by Anthony Burgess, 1958.

  14 Copy quote

• Beckett does not believe in God, though he seems to imply that God has committed an unforgivable sin by not existing.

  Anthony Burgess

  Believe, Unforgivable Sin, Doe

  Anthony Burgess (1971). “The Novel To-day”

  28 Copy quote

• There is, in fact, not much point in writing a novel unless you can show the possibility of moral transformation, or an increase in wisdom, operating in your chief character or characters. Even trashy bestsellers show people changing. When a fictional work fails to show change, when it merely indicates that human character is set, stony, unregenerable, then you are out of field of the novel and into that of the fable or the allegory. - from the introduction of the 1986 Norton edition

  Anthony Burgess

  Writing, Character, People

  7 Copy quote

• Only in England is the perversion of language regarded as a victory for democracy.

  Anthony Burgess

  America, Victory, Democracy

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• We only need to wear shoes because the British built roads which hurt our feet.

  Anthony Burgess

  Funny, Hurt, Shoes

  Anthony Burgess (1959). “Malayan Trilogy: Time for a Tiger. The Enemy in the Blanket; Beds in the East”

  5 Copy quote

• We all need money, but there are degrees of desperation.

  Anthony Burgess

  Money, Degrees, Needs

  54 Copy quote

• There is, in fact, not much point in writing a novel unless you can show the possibility of moral transformation, or an increase in wisdom, operating in your chief character or characters.

  Anthony Burgess

  Writing, Character, Facts

  "A Clockwork Orange".

  28 Copy quote

• A Haydn symphony had a meaning for the social group that listened to it. A Mahler symphony had a meaning for the man who composed it. Here is the difference between the classical and romantic attitudes to art.

  Anthony Burgess

  Art, Attitude, Men

  12 Copy quote

• Evil has to exist along with good, in order that moral choice may operate.

  Anthony Burgess

  Order, Evil, Choices

  Anthony Burgess (2011). “A Clockwork Orange”, p.13, W. W. Norton & Company

  7 Copy quote

• Literature ceases to be literature when it commits itself to moral uplift; it becomes moral philosophy or some such dull thing.

  Anthony Burgess

  Uplifting, Philosophy, Literature

  Anthony Burgess (2012). “The Kingdom of the Wicked”, p.4, Allison & Busby

  26 Copy quote

• Every grain of experience is food for the greedy growing soul of the artist.

  Anthony Burgess

  Art, Soul, Growing

  Anthony Burgess (1982). “Here comes everybody: an introduction to James Joyce for the ordinary reader”, Hamlyn

  9 Copy quote

• For the serious artist does not satisfy needs

  Anthony Burgess

  Artist, Doe, Needs

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• It's funny how the colors of the real world only seem really real when you watch them on a screen.

  Anthony Burgess

  Life, Real, Color

  21 Copy quote

• Is it better for a man to have chosen evil than to have good imposed upon him?

  Anthony Burgess

  Men, Evil, Dystopia

  31 Copy quote

• All art preserves mysteries which aesthetic philosophers tackle in vain.

  Anthony Burgess

  Art, Philosopher, Mystery

  "A Mouthful of Air: Language and Languages, Especially English". Book by Anthony Burgess, October 1992.

  4 Copy quote

• Senseless violence is a prerogative of youth, which has much energy but little talent for the constructive.

  Anthony Burgess

  Energy, Littles, Violence

  Anthony Burgess (2011). “A Clockwork Orange”, p.11, W. W. Norton & Company

  11 Copy quote

• Bath twice a day to be really clean, once a day to be passably clean, once a week to avoid being a public menace.

  Anthony Burgess

  Baths, Cleanliness, Week

  1963 Inside Mr Enderby, pt.2, ch.1.

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• Colonialism. The enforced spread of the rule of reason. But who is going to spread it among the colonizers?

  Anthony Burgess

  Colonialism, Reason, Colonization

  Anthony Burgess (2012). “Earthly Powers”, p.242, Random House

  13 Copy quote

• Do they merit vitriol, even a drop of it? Yes, because they corrupt the young, persuading them that the mature world, which produced Beethoven and Schweitzer, sets an even higher value on the transient anodynes of youth than does youth itself.... They are the Hollow Men. They are electronic lice.

  Anthony Burgess

  Men, Merit, Doe

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• ... A CLOCKWORK ORANGE- and I said: 'That's a fair gloopy title. Who ever heard of a clockwork orange?' Then I read a malenky bit out loud in a sort of very high type preaching goloss: '- The attempt to impose upon a man, a creature of growth and capable of sweetness, to ooze juicily at the last round the bearded lips of God, to attempt to impose, I say, laws and conditions appropriate to a mechanical creation, against this I raise my swordpen-

  Anthony Burgess

  Men, Orange, Law

  A Clockwork Orange (1962) p. 21

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• If you want to be considered a poet, you will have to show mastery of the petrarchan sonnet form or the sestina. Your musical efforts must begin with well-formed fugues. There is no substitute for craft... Art begins with craft, and there is no art until craft has been mastered.

  Anthony Burgess

  Art, Effort, Musical

  Anthony Burgess (1986). “But Do Blondes Prefer Gentlemen?: Homage to Qwert Yuiop, and Other Writings”, New York : McGraw-Hill

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• Ignorance and poverty are the best condiments for the great feast of the world, but the inexperienced and poor are never invited to it.

  Anthony Burgess

  Ignorance, World, Poverty

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• Life is, of course, terrible.

  Anthony Burgess

  Life Is, Terrible, Courses

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• A word in a dictionary is very much like a car in a mammoth motor show - full of potential but temporarily inactive.

  Anthony Burgess

  Car, Shows, Dictionary

  Anthony Burgess (1964). “Language made plain”

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