Robertson Davies quotes on thetimes It was easier to keep myself from becoming a success as an actor. – Robertson Davies The great book for you is the book that has … It was from their self-knowledge they spoke. Robertson Davies, "Fifth Business" One of the really notable achievements of the twentieth century has been to make the young old before their time. all men of extraordinary character, and they devised systems that are forever stamped with that character.… Davey, did you ever think that these three men who were so splendid at understanding others had first to understand themselves? He was one of the most popular and best-known authors in Canada, and one of its most distinguished "men of letters," a term that Davies … It is also his most difficult task. Goodreads helps you follow your favorite authors. Authors like cats because they are such quiet, lovable, wise creatures, and cats like authors for the same reasons. Quotations by Robertson Davies, Novelist, Canadian, Born August 28, 1913. Leola and I, when romance was stripped away, were too much alike; our strengths and weaknesses were too nearly the same. Canada is not really a place where you are encouraged to have large spiritual adventures. Tristan and Isolde were lucky to die when they did. 28 quotes by Robertson Davies. The world is full of people whose notion of a satisfactory future is, in fact, a return to the idealised past. We wanted to meet him, for though we were neither of us naive people we had not wholly lost our belief that it is delightful to meet artists who have given us pleasure. William Robertson Davies CC OOnt FRSL FRSC (28 August 1913 – 2 December 1995) was a Canadian novelist, playwright, critic, journalist, and professor. #Men #Luck #Things Happen A truly great book should be read in youth, again in maturity and once more in old age, as a fine building should be seen by morning light, at noon and by moonlight. #Morning #Book #Reading “Authors like cats because they are such quiet, lovable, wise creatures, and cats like authors for the same reasons.”-- Robertson Davies . The most original thing a writer can do is write like himself. Robertson Davies Quotes - 2 Many authors write like amateur blacksmiths making their first horseshoe; the clank of the anvil, the stench of the scorched leather apron, the sparks and the cursing are palpable, and this appeals to those who rank "sincerity" very high. Just as we complete them, of course; it’s not a one-way thing. God save us from reading nothing but the best. *What we call luck is the inner man externalized. He was one of Canada's best known and most popular authors and one of its most distinguished "men of letters", a term Davies is variously said to have bo th gladly accepted for himself and to have detested. But there are others who will lie and scheme and steal to get books as wildly and unconscionably as the dope-taker in pursuit of his drug. Sourced quotations by the Canadian Journalist Robertson Davies (1913 — 1995) about people, life and man - Page 9. WhatsApp “My own opinion is that [love] is felt most completely in marriage, or some comparable attachment of long duration. William Robertson Davies, CC, FRSC, FRSL (died in Orangeville, Ontario) was a Canadian novelist, playwright, journalist, critic, and professor. You come when you can, and leave when you must. What we call luck is the inner man externalized. 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.”, “Love affairs are for emotional sprinters; the pleasures of love are for the emotional marathoners.”, “Boredom and stupidity and patriotism, especially when combined, are three of the greatest evils of the world we live in.”, “To be a book-collector is to combine the worst characteristics of a dope fiend with those of a miser.”, “This is the Great Theatre of Life. Robertson Davies Quotes William Robertson Davies was a Canadian novelist, playwright, critic, journalist, and professor. “ The young are often accused of exaggerating their troubles; they do so, very often, in the hope of making some impression upon the … Robertson Davies, "A Voice from the Attic", 1960 - More quotations on: [ The Future] He was a genius - that is to say, a man who does superlatively and without obvious effort something that most people cannot do by the uttermost exertion of their abilities. *Nothing is so easy to fake as the inner vision. Pinterest. Update this biography » Complete biography of Robertson Davies » Critics were careful not to outrage my modesty by their praise, and the public scrupulously refused to debauch me with applause. Robertson Davies-+ +3. You never see what you want to see, forever playing to the gallery. — Robertson Davies, libro The Diary of Samuel Marchbanks The Diary of Samuel Marchbanks (1947), Context: It seems to me that most of us get all the adventure we are capable of digesting. Their very conservatism is secondhand, and they don't know what they are conserving. By. The spider gets his thread right out of his own guts, and that is where the author gets his writing.”, “I was afraid and did not know what I feared, which is the worst kind of fear.”, “A happy childhood has spoiled many a promising life.”, “Nothing grows old-fashioned so fast as modernity.”, “So -- I confess I have been a rake at reading. Update this biography » Complete biography of Robertson Davies » Robertson Davies. Famous As: Author and Journalist A happy childhood has spoiled many a promising life. Quotation - August 18, 2020. You couldn't incorporate it into a modern state, beacuse it is the antithesis of the anxiously worshiped security which is what a modern state is asked to give. He edited the Robertson Davies Quotes A collection of thoughts and quotes by Robertson Davies on philosophy, books, reading, writing, perspective, belief, bias, love, reality and adversity. Nothing is so easy to fake as the inner vision. *Biography at its best is a form of fiction. Robertson Davies Quotes. It was a draw; they claimed superiority because of their long history, and I claimed it because of Canada's immense land mass, which gives us space for tremendous expansion, even of such things as dullness. He attended Upper Canada College from 1926 to 1932 and went on to Queen's University from 1932 to 1935 as a special student not working towards a degree. Facebook. Read and enjoy the great quotations by Robertson Davies. It is probably a matter of temperament, and for anything I know it may be glandular. He spent 1940 playing minor roles and doi… 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. To be a book-collector is to combine the worst characteristics of a dope fiend with those of a miser. Students today are a pretty solemn lot. Quotes by "Robertson Davies" The critic is the duenna in the passionate affair between playwrights, actors and audiences - a figure dreaded, and occasionally comic, but never welcome, never loved. — Robertson Davies. Of course wonder is costly. And that depends on your age, your experience, your psychological and spiritual need. May I make a suggestion, hoping it is not an impertinence? Collection of quotes from Robertson Davies. The show is continuous. Freud, monumentally hipped on sex (for which he personally had little use) and almost ignorant of Nature: Adler, reducing almost everything to the will to power: and Jung, certainly the most humane and gentlest of them, and possibly the greatest, but nevertheless the descendant of parsons and professors, and himself a super-parson and a super-professor. I can only protest, like all rakes in their shameful senescence, that I have had a good time.”, “We have educated ourselves into a world from which wonder, and he fear and dread and splendor and freedom of wonder have been banished. ”, “I object to being told that I am saving daylight when my reason tells me that I am doing nothing of the kind... At the back of the Daylight Saving scheme, I detect the bony, blue-fingered hand of Puritanism, eager to push people into bed earlier, and get them up earlier, to make them healthy, wealthy, and wise in spite of themselves.”, “She herself was a victim of that lust for books which rages in the breast like a demon, and which cannot be stilled save by the frequent and plentiful acquisition of books. Free Daily Quotes. Robertson Davies, novelist and playwright whose works offer penetrating observations on Canadian provincialism and prudery. These are the best and most popular Robertson Davies quotes. “A truly great book should be read in youth, again in maturity and once more in old age, as a fine building should be seen by morning light, at noon and by moonlight.”, “The eye sees only what the mind is prepared to comprehend.”, “Authors like cats because they are such quiet, lovable, wise creatures, and cats like authors for the same reasons.”, “Extraordinary people survive under the most terrible circumstances and they become more extraordinary because of it.”, “I wish people weren't so set on being themselves, when that means being a bastard.”, “Happiness is always a by-product. I never heard of anyone who was really literate or who ever really loved books who wanted to suppress any of them. Let us know what’s wrong with this preview of, The Deptford Trilogy: Fifth Business/The Manticore/World of Wonders, The Merry Heart: Reflections on Reading Writing & the World of Books. 1 2 Next . The great book for you is the book that has the most to say to you at the moment when you are reading. -- Robertson Davies . Robertson Davies Quotes Search in the quotations of Robertson Davies : ''Too much traffic with a quotation book begets a conviction of ignorance in a sensitive reader. The quality of what is said inevitably influences the way in which it is said, however inexperienced the writer. The greatest gift that Oxford gives her sons is, I truly believe, a genial irreverence toward learning, and from that irreverence love may spring. Be the first to learn about new releases! Write it down: write down what you feel. He received a BLit in 1938 at Balliol College, Oxford. A Librettist is a mere drudge in the world of opera. Love takes time. You don't know what that is? The eye sees only what the mind is prepared to comprehend. Personally, I have never had to fight a dozen pirates single-handed, and I have never jumped from a moving express-train onto the back of a horse, and I have never been discovered in the harem of the Grand Turk. We make things happen to us. Just a moment while we sign you in to your Goodreads account. I have read those things which I ought not to have read, and I have not read those things which I ought to have read, and there is no health in me -- if by health you mean an inclusive and coherent knowledge of any body of great literature. Tags: critics-and-criticism. Robertson Davies. We make things happen to us.”-- Robertson Davies . Third son of Senator William Rupert Davies, Robertson Davies participated in stage productions as a child and developed a lifelong interest in drama. “Who are you? I have known people who have actually read all, or almost all, the guaranteed Hundred Best Books. They dared heroically. *Experience is wine, and art is the brandy we distill from it. – Robertson Davies We wanted to meet him, for though we were neither of us naive people we had not wholly lost our belief that it is delightful to meet artists who have given us pleasure. Subscribe Robertson Davies — Canadian Novelist born on August 28, 1913, died on December 02, 1995 William Robertson Davies, CC, OOnt, FRSC, FRSL was a Canadian novelist, playwright, critic, journalist, and professor. Quotes: Robertson Davies Quotes 1 till 15 of 18. No people in the world can make you feel so small as the English. 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. Do you know who I think you are, Ramsay? -Robertson Davies Reading If I had my way books would not be written in English, but in an exceedingly difficult secret language that only skilled professional readers and story-tellers could interpret. It is undemocratic, discriminatory and pitiless.”, “Fanaticism is overcompensation for doubt.”, “To be apt in quotation is a splendid and dangerous gift. Selected Robertson Davies Quotes at 9quotes. A truly great book should be read in youth, again in maturity and once more in old age, as a fine building should be seen by morning light, at noon and by moonlight. Only a fool expects to be happy all the time. Robertson Davies Quotes The world is full of people whose notion of a satisfactory future is, in fact, a return to the idealised past. 35 Robertson Davies Quotes - BrainyQuote The eye sees only what the mind is prepared to comprehend. Every man is wise when attacked by a mad dog; fewer when pursued by a mad woman; only the wisest survive when attacked by a mad notion. Twitter. But a contrary theory is possible - that we simply recognize different things at different times and in different ways.”, “To ask an author who hopes to be a serious writer if his work is autobiographical is like asking a spider where he buys his thread. They'd have been sick of all that rubbish in a year. BrainyQuote has been providing inspirational quotes since 2001 to our worldwide community. “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. They did not go trustingly to some doctor and follow his lead because they were too lazy or too scared to make the inward journey alone. When romance was stripped away, were too much alike ; our strengths and weaknesses were much. In fact, a year in which he pursued an acting career outside.... 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