Tom Stoppard
Tom Stoppard
Sir Tom Stoppard OM CBE FRSLis a British playwright and screenwriter, knighted in 1997. He has written prolifically for TV, radio, film and stage, finding prominence with plays such as Arcadia, The Coast of Utopia, Every Good Boy Deserves Favour, Professional Foul, The Real Thing, and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. He co-wrote the screenplays for Brazil, The Russia House, and Shakespeare in Love, and has received one Academy Award and four Tony Awards. Themes of human rights, censorship and...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionPlaywright
Date of Birth3 July 1937
CityZlin, Czech Republic
It's silly to be depressed by it. I mean one thinks of it like being alive in a box, one keeps forgetting to take into account the fact that one is dead, which should make all the difference, shouldn't it? I mean, you'd never know you were in a box would you?... Even taking into account the fact that you're dead, it isn't a pleasant thought. Especially if you're dead, really. Ask yourself, if I asked you straight off-- I'm going to stuff you in this box now would you rather be alive or dead? Naturally you'd prefer to be alive. Life in a box is better than no life at all.
Audiences know what to expect, and that is all that they are prepared to believe in.
Chater: You dare to call me that. I demand satisfaction! Septimus: Mrs Chater demanded satisfaction and now you are demanding satisfaction. I cannot spend my time day and night satisfying the demands of the Chater family.
For all the compasses in the world, there's only one direction, and time is its only measure.
The universe is deterministic all right, just like Newton said, I mean it's trying to be, but the only thing going wrong is people fancying people who aren't supposed to be in that part of the plan.
We're better at predicting events at the edge of the galaxy or inside the nucleus of an atom than whether it'll rain on auntie's garden party three Sundays from now.
Death followed by eternity the worst of both worlds. It is a terrible thought.
Seduced her? Every time I turned round she was up a library ladder. In the end I gave in. That reminds me—I spotted something between her legs that made me think of you.
Carnal embrace is the practice of throwing one's arms around a side of beef.
You think human nature is a beast, that it must be put in a cage. But it's the cage that makes the animal bad.
I will take his secret to the grave, telling people I meet on the way.
I was so thrilled being a reporter, because it gave you the kind of access to people that you wouldn't ever get to meet.
Obviously, you would give your life for your children, or give them the last biscuit on the plate. But to me, the trick in life is to take that sense of generosity between kin, make it apply to the extended family and to your neighbour, your village and beyond.
Every age thinks it's the modern age, but this one really is. Electricity is going to change everything. Everything!