Richard Brinsley Sheridan
Richard Brinsley Sheridan
Richard Brinsley Butler Sheridanwas an Irish satirist; a playwright and poet, and long-term owner of the London Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. He is known for his plays such as The Rivals, The School for Scandal, The Duenna and A Trip to Scarborough. For thirty-two years he was also a Whig MP in the British House of Commons for Stafford, Westminsterand Ilchester. He is buried at Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey. His plays remain a central part of the canon, and...
NationalityIrish
ProfessionPlaywright
Date of Birth30 October 1751
CountryIreland
The quarrel is a very pretty quarrel as it stands - we should only spoil it by trying to explain it.
My valour is certainly going! - it is sneaking off! - I feel it oozing out as it were at the palms of my hands!
You shall see them on a beautiful quarto page where a neat rivulet of text shall meander through a meadow of margin.
An unforgiving eye, and a damned disinheriting countenance!
Nay, but Jack, such eyes! such eyes! so innocently wild! so bashfully irresolute! Not a glance but speaks and kindles some thought of love! Then, Jack, her cheeks! her cheeks, Jack! so deeply blushing at the insinuations of her tell-tale eyes! Then, Jack, her lips! O, Jack, lips smiling at their own discretion! and, if not smiling, more sweetly pouting - more lovely in sullenness! Then, Jack, her neck! O, Jack, Jack!
Madam, a circulating library in a town is as an evergreen tree of diabolical knowledge; it blossoms through the year. And depend on it that they who are so fond of handling the leaves, will long for the fruit at last.
If I reprehend anything in this world, it is the use of my oracular tongue, and a nice derangement of epitaphs!
There is nothing on earth so easy as to forget, if a person chooses to set about it. I'm sure I have as much forgot your poor, dear uncle, as if he had never existed; and I thought it my duty to do so.
No scandal about Queen Elizabeth, I hope?
I ne'er could any lustre see In eyes that would not look on me; I ne'er saw nectar on a lip But where my own did hope to sip.
As there are three of us come on purpose for the game, you won't be so cantankerous as to spoil the party by sitting out.
Here is the whole set! a character dead at every word.
I leave my character behind me.
An apothecary should never be out of spirits.