Cyril Connolly
Cyril Connolly
Cyril Vernon Connollywas a literary critic and writer. He was the editor of the influential literary magazine Horizonand wrote Enemies of Promise, which combined literary criticism with an autobiographical exploration of why he failed to become the successful author of fiction that he had aspired to be in his youth...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionJournalist
Date of Birth10 September 1903
men fats thin-man
Imprisoned in every fat man a thin man is wildly signaling to be let out.
self dungeons prison
We are all serving a life sentence in the dungeon of the self.
growing-up moving son
Boys do not grow up gradually. They move forward in spurts like the hands of clocks in railway stations.
writing watches world
A great writer created a world of his own and his readers are proud to live in it. A lesser writer may entice them in for a moment, but soon he will watch them filing out.
dream memories reading
There is immunity in reading, immunity in formal society, in office routine, in the company of old friends and in the giving of officious help to strangers, but there is no sanctuary in one bed from the memory of another. The past with its anguish will break through every defense-line of custom and habit; we must sleep and therefore we must dream.
life mazes walks
Life is a maze in which we take the wrong turning before we have learned to walk.
stupid intelligent law
English Law: where there are two alternatives: one intelligent, one stupid; one attractive, one vulgar; one noble, one ape-like; one serious and sincere, one undignified and false; one far-sighted, one short; EVERYBODY will INVARIABLY choose the latter.
disappointment loss boredom
Obesity is a mental state, a disease brought on by boredom and disappointment.
friendship girl cousin
In America every woman has her set of girl-friends; some are cousins, the rest are gained at school. These form a permanent committee who sit on each other's affairs, who come out together, marry and divorce together, and who end as those groups of bustling, heartless well-informed club-women who govern society. Against them the Couple of Ehepaar is helpless and Man in their eyes but a biological interlude.
ignorance passion darkness
Purity engenders Wisdom, Passion avarice, and Ignorance folly, infatuation and darkness.
responsibility world tire
We create the world in which we live; if that world becomes unfit for human life, it is because we tire of our responsibility.
names infinite live-in-the-present
Idleness is only a coarse name for my infinite capacity for living in the present.
lamps way peeking
The only way for writers to meet is to share a quick peek over a common lamp-post.
tree green epitaph
Green leaves on a dead tree is our epitaph-green leaves, dear reader, on a dead tree.