Frasi di Evelyn Waugh pagina 4

“E perché non dovrei esserlo [geloso], quando vedo spendere tanto denaro per dei parenti che furono detestati tutta la vita; mentre i cani che li avevano amati, che erano stati vicini a loro senza chiedere niente, senza lamentarsi, fossero ricchi o poveri, sani o malati, vengono sepolti come va va, proprio da bestie?”

Wilbur Kenworthy, il sognatore.
Il caro estinto

“Molti lasciano declinare prematuramente la propria energia vitale e diminuire la capacità produttiva semplicemente per paura della morte. Eliminando tale paura, prolungano di valore la loro esistenza. Scelga dunque con comodo, e mentre è in buona salute, la forma che più le conviene per l'atto finale; paghi finché è nelle migliori condizioni di farlo; dia il bando a tutte le preoccupazioni. Lasci fare a noi, signor Barlow, la nostra Istituzione se la caverà.”

Il caro estinto

“[Mr. Corker:] È stato quel trucco della barba. Sapevo che ci avrebbe messo nei guai.
– Ma è un impiegato delle ferrovie. L'ho visto nella biglietteria oggi, quando sono andato a chiedere del mio bagaglio.
– Certo che lo è. Ma a noi che ce ne importa? Schumble ha lanciato la notizia e adesso noi dobbiamo trovare un agente rosso o siamo fritti.
– Oppure spiegare l'errore.
– Rischioso, vecchio mio, e poco professionale. Sono quelle cose che puoi fare una volta o due in caso di vera emergenza, ma non conviene. I giornali non stampano smentite, è ovvio: diminuisce la fiducia del pubblico nella stampa. E poi si dà l'impressione che noi non facciamo bene il nostro mestiere. Sarebbe troppo facile se ogni volta che uno ha una notizia in esclusiva, il resto del branco la smentisse. E debbo riconoscere che quella di Schumble è stata un'ottima idea … la barba ha avuto la sua parte, naturalmente… avrei potuto pensarci io stesso, se non fossi stato così arrabbiato.”

Il caro estinto

Evelyn Waugh libro L'inviato speciale

dialogo fra Mr. Corker e Mr. William Boot, libro II, Stones 20 £, cap. 1, XI
L'inviato speciale
Origine: Nome gergale dato nel testo al gruppo di inviati speciali concentrati in una determinata zona per il medesimo motivo.

Evelyn Waugh Frasi e Citazioni

“Corker lo guardò sconsolato: Sa che le dico? Lei deve imparare ancora molte cose sul giornalismo. Mettiamola così. Le notizie sono quella cosa che un tale che non si interessa un gran ché di nulla vuole leggere. Ed è notizia fin tanto che lui la legge. Dopo, è morta. Noi siamo pagati per fornire notizie. Se qualcun altro ha mandato un dispaccio prima di noi, la nostra storia non fa notizia. Certo, c'è il colore. Il colore è un mucchio di chiacchiere a vuoto: facile da scrivere e facile da leggere, ma costa troppo in telegrammi, per cui dobbiamo andarci piano. Capito?”

Evelyn Waugh libro L'inviato speciale

L'inviato speciale

“È un istinto naturale di ritirarsi davanti all'ignoto.”

“[Funzionario:] Anche ammettendo che a Ismaelia ci sia il petrolio, come intende farlo uscire?
– Ma io non ho alcun interesse per il commercio. Vado a farci la cronaca della guerra.
– La guerra non è che commercio.”

Il caro estinto

Evelyn Waugh libro L'inviato speciale

dialogo fra Mr. W. Boot e un funzionario coloniale francese, libro I, The Stitch service, cap. 5, I
L'inviato speciale

“Languisco lentamente tra le tue braccia, in questo silenzioso confine del mondo.”

“Quando la gente odia con tanta foga, vuol dire che odia qualcosa che ha dentro di sé.”

Il caro estinto

Evelyn Waugh libro Ritorno a Brideshead

Brideshead Revisited: The Sacred and Profane Memories of Captain Charles Ryder

Evelyn Waugh: Frasi in inglese

“All day the heat had been barely supportable but at evening a breeze arose in the West, blowing from the heart of the setting sun and from the ocean, which lay unseen, unheard behind the scrubby foothills. It shook the rusty fringes of palm-leaf and swelled the dry sounds of summer, the frog-voices, the grating cicadas, and the ever present pulse of music from the neighbouring native huts.”

“Don't give your opinions about Art and the Purpose of Life. They are of little interest and, anyway, you can't express them. Don't analyze yourself. Give the relevant facts and let your readers make their own judgments. Stick to your story. It is not the most important subject in history but it is one about which you are uniquely qualified to speak.”

Evelyn Waugh libro Il caro estinto

First lines
The Loved One (1948)

“Chokey thinks religion is just divine.”

Reviewing World within World, the autobiography of Stephen Spender, in The Tablet (5 May 1951)

“You see my adjutant made rather a silly mistake. He hadn't had much truck with boots before and the silly fellow thought they were extra rations. My men ate the whole bag of tricks last night.”

Evelyn Waugh libro Declino e caduta

Decline and Fall (1928)

“The human mind is inspired enough when it comes to inventing horrors; it is when it tries to invent a Heaven that it shows itself cloddish.”

Evelyn Waugh libro Black Mischief

Origine: Black Mischief (1932), Chapter 5

“…Conversation should be like juggling; up go the balls and the plates, up and over, in and out, good solid objects that glitter in the footlights and fall with a bang if you miss them. But when dear Sebastian speaks it is like a little sphere of soapsud drifting off the end of an old clay pipe, anywhere, full of rainbow light for a second and then - phut! vanished, with nothing left at all, nothing.”

Evelyn Waugh libro Put Out More Flags

Origine: Put Out More Flags (1942), Ch. 1 : Autumn, § 7

“Only when one has lost all curiosity about the future has one reached the age to write an autobiography.”

Evelyn Waugh libro Ritorno a Brideshead

Part 1, Chapter 2
Brideshead Revisited (1945)

“But what am I to teach them?' said Paul in sudden panic.”

Evelyn Waugh libro A Little Learning

First lines
A Little Learning (1964)

“We class schools, you see, into four grades: Leading School, First-rate School, Good School, and School. Frankly," said Mr Levy, "School is pretty bad…”

Evelyn Waugh libro Declino e caduta

Decline and Fall (1928)

“He was gifted with the sly, sharp instinct for self-preservation that passes for wisdom among the rich.”

Evelyn Waugh libro Declino e caduta

Part One, Chapter One
Decline and Fall (1928)

“Instead of this absurd division into sexes they ought to class people as static and dynamic.”

Evelyn Waugh libro L'inviato speciale

Scoop (1938)

“Your action, and your action alone, determines your worth.”

Evelyn Waugh libro Declino e caduta

Decline and Fall (1928)

“The Beast stands for strong mutually antagonistic governments everywhere," he said. "Self-sufficiency at home, self-assertion abroad.”

Johann Gottlieb Fichte in The Vocation of Man [Die Bestimmung des Menschen] (1800), p. 94 : "You are here, not for idle contemplation of yourself, not for brooding over devout sensations — no, for action you are here; action, and action alone, determines your worth." [Nicht zum müßigen Beschauen und Betrachten deiner selbst, oder zum Brüten über andächtigen Empfindungen, — nein, zum Handeln bist du da; dein Handeln und allein dein Handeln bestimmt deinen Werth.]
Misattributed

“"We, Seth, Emperor of Azania, Chief of Chiefs of Sakuyu, Lord of Wanda and Tyrant of the Seas, Bachelor of the Arts of Oxford University, being in this the twenty-fourth year of our life, summoned by the wisdom of Almighty God and the unanimous voice of our people to the throne of our ancestors, do hereby proclaim…" Seth paused in his dictation and gazed out across the harbour where in the fresh breeze of early morning the last dhow was setting sail for the open sea. "Rats," he said; "stinking curs. They are all running away."”

Evelyn Waugh libro L'inviato speciale

A quote from Lord Copper.
Scoop (1938)

“When I reached C Company lines, which were at the top of the hill, I paused and looked back at the camp, just coming into full view below me through the grey mist of early morning.”

Evelyn Waugh libro Black Mischief

First lines
Black Mischief (1932)

“O God, if there is a God, forgive him his sins, if there is such a thing as sin.”

Evelyn Waugh libro Ritorno a Brideshead

First lines of Prologue
Brideshead Revisited (1945)

“A typical triumph of modern science to find the only part of Randolph that was not malignant and remove it.”

Evelyn Waugh libro Ritorno a Brideshead

Brideshead Revisited (1945)

“Quomodo sedet sola civitas. Vanity of vanities, all is vanity.”

Origine: Diary entry (March 1964), after hearing that doctors had removed a benign tumor from Randolph Churchill, quoted in The Diaries of Evelyn Waugh, ed. Michael Davie (1976), p. 792

“How ungenerously in later life we disclaim the virtuous moods of our youth, living in retrospect long, summer days of unreflecting dissipation. There is no candour in a story of early manhood which leaves out of account the home-sickness for nursery morality, the regrets and resolutions of amendment, the black hours which, like zero on the roulette table, turn up with roughly calculable regularity.”

Evelyn Waugh libro Ritorno a Brideshead

Epilogue
Brideshead Revisited (1945)

“My theme is memory, that winged host that soared about me one grey morning of war-time.”

Evelyn Waugh libro Ritorno a Brideshead

Brideshead Revisited (1945)

“I have lived carefully, sheltered myself from the cold winds, eaten moderately of what was in season, drunk fine claret, slept in my own sheets; I shall live long.”

Evelyn Waugh libro Ritorno a Brideshead

Brideshead Revisited (1945)

“Don't hold your parents up to contempt. After all, you are their son, and it is just possible that you may take after them.”

Evelyn Waugh libro Ritorno a Brideshead

Part 3, chapter 5, Lord Marchmain's dying soliloquy.
Brideshead Revisited (1945)

“Up to a point, Lord Copper.”

The Tablet (9 May 1951)

“So the two of them went to London by the early morning train. 'Let's surprise her,' said Nigel, but Cedric telephoned first, wryly remembering the story of the pedantic adulterer - 'My dear, it is I who am surprised; you are astounded.”

Evelyn Waugh libro L'inviato speciale

Lord Copper, proprietor of the Daily Beast is a man to whom one never says 'No' directly. This is what one says instead.
Scoop (1938)

“I will not stand for being called a woman in my own house…”

Evelyn Waugh libro Put Out More Flags

Origine: Put Out More Flags (1942), Ch. 3 : Spring

“What is this impulse of two people to build their beastly home? It's you & me, unborn, asserting our presence. All we are is a manifestation of the impulse to family life, and if by chance we have escaped the itch ourselves, Nature forces it upon us another way.”

Evelyn Waugh libro L'inviato speciale

Scoop (1938)

“I don't believe that people would ever fall in love or want to be married if they hadn't been told about it. It's like abroad: no one would want to go there if they hadn't been told it existed.”

Evelyn Waugh libro Declino e caduta

Part One, Chapter XII
Decline and Fall (1928)

“We, Seth, Emperor of Azania, Chief of Chiefs of Sakuyu, Lord of Wanda and Tyrant of the Seas, Bachelor of the Arts of Oxford University, being in this the twenty-fourth year of our life, summoned by the wisdom of Almighty God and the unanimous voice of our people to the throne of our ancestors, do hereby proclaim...”

Evelyn Waugh libro Declino e caduta

Decline and Fall (1928)

“I have become very old in the last two years. Not diseased but enfeebled. There is nowhere I want to go and nothing I want to do and I am conscious of being an utter bore. The Vatican Council has knocked the guts out of me.”

Evelyn Waugh libro Black Mischief

Seth paused in his dictation and gazed out across the harbour where in the fresh breeze of early morning the last dhow was setting sail for the open sea. "Rats," he said; "stinking curs. They are all running away."
First lines
Black Mischief (1932)

“I find the new liturgy a temptation against Faith, Hope and Charity but I shall never, pray God, apostatise.”

Letter to Lady Mosley (9 March 1966), quoted in The Letters of Evelyn Waugh, ed. Mark Amory (1980), p. 638