Alan Bennett
Alan Bennett
Alan Bennettis an English playwright, screenwriter, actor and author. He was born in Leeds and attended Oxford University where he studied history and performed with the Oxford Revue. He stayed to teach and research medieval history at the university for several years. His collaboration as writer and performer with Dudley Moore, Jonathan Miller and Peter Cook in the satirical revue Beyond the Fringe at the 1960 Edinburgh Festival brought him instant fame. He gave up academia, and turned to writing...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionScreenwriter
Date of Birth9 May 1934
I'm not good at precise, coherent argument. But plays are suited to incoherent argument, put into the mouths of fallible people.
If you think squash is a competitive activity, try flower arranging.
Memories are not shackles, Franklin, they are garlands.
History is a commentary on the various and continuing incapabilities of men. What is history? History is women following behind with the bucket.
There's very little in the substance of [THE LADY IN THE VAN] which is not fact though some adjustments have had to be made. Over the years Miss Shepherd was visited by a succession of social workers so the character in the play is a composite figure. . . . A composite too are the neighbours, Pauline and Rufus, though I have made Rufus a publisher in remembrance of my neighbour, the late Colin Haycraft, the proprietor of Duckworth's.
At the drabber moments of my life (swilling some excrement from the steps, for instance, or rooting with a bent coat-hanger down a blocked sink) thoughts occur like 'I bet Tom Stoppard doesn't have to do this' or There is no doubt David Hare would have deputed this to an underling'.
Mark my words, when a society has to resort to the lavatory for its humour, the writing is on the wall.
The longer I practise medicine, the more convinced I am there are only two types of cases: those that involve taking the trousers off and those that don't.
[B]riefing is not reading. In fact it is the antithesis of reading. Briefing is terse, factual and to the point. Reading is untidy, discursive and perpetually inviting. Briefing closes down a subject, reading opens it up.
Remember. You are a physician. You are not a policeman nor are you a minister of religion. You must take people as they come. Remember, too that though you will generally know more about the condition than the patient, it is the patient who has the condition and this if nothing else bestows on him or her a kind of wisdom. You have the knowledge but that does not entitle you to be superior. Knowledge makes you the servant not the master.
What she was finding also was how one book led to another, doors kept opening wherever she turned and the days weren't long enough for the reading she wanted to do.
Sometimes there is no next time, no time-outs, no second chances. Sometimes it’s now or never.
Life is rather like a tin of sardines - we're all of us looking for the key.
I saw someone peeing in Jermym Street the other day. I thought, is this the end of civilization as we know it? Or is it simply someone peeing in Jermyn Street?