Stella Gibbons

“On the whole, Cold Comfort was not without its promise of mystery and excitement.”

“It is rather frightening to be able to write so revoltingly, yet so successfully. All these letters are works of art, except, perhaps, the last. They are positively oily.”

“After another minute Reuben brought forth the following sentence:"I ha' scranleted two hundred furrows come five o'clock down i' the bute."It was a difficult remark, Flora felt, to which to reply.”

“The education bestowed on Flora Poste by her parents had been expensive, athletic and prolonged; and when they died within a few weeks of one another during the annual epidemic of the influenza or Spanish Plague which occurred in her twentieth year, she was discovered to possess every art and grace save that of earning her own living.”

“There are some things (like first love and one’s first reviews) at which a woman in her middle years does not care to look too closely.”

“Curious how Love destroys every vestige of that politeness which the human race, in its years of evolution, has so painfully acquired.”

“Surely she had endured enough for one evening without having to listen to intelligent conversation?”

“. . . What a pleasant life could be had in this world by a handsome, sensible old lady of good fortune, blessed with a sound constitution and a firm will”

“An interesting survival of mediaeval superstition," commented Flora.”

“Mary, you know I hate parties. My idea of hell is a very large party in a cold room where everybody has to play hockey properly.”

“Dear, Missus, Mister - I beg you never to give thoughts to war, in no way, not to work for it, not by writing nor by reading about it nor by looking at the pictures nor on the television about it. Not in any way ever, at all. Not by being a soldier, sailor, airman, work in factory or above all at atom bombs. Above all at atom bombs. No obligation for this, dear fellow creature. Signed Your Fellow Creature.''P.S.,' said Gerald slowly, without turning from the window, 'If we all do this, we shall succeed.”

“Flora sighed. It was curious that persons who lived what the novelists called a rich emotional life always seemed to be a bit slow on the uptake.”

“While she lay there with these old worn thoughts coming obediently into her mind, called there by habit and the familiar quiet of early morning, she was aware that at the back of her mind there was another thought that was not at all stale, but so fresh that it was nearly a feeling, with all a feeling's delicious power to kill thought.”

“Happiness can never hope to command so much interest as distress.”

“Well, when I am fifty-three or so I would like to write a novel as good as Persuasion but with a modern setting, of course. For the next thirty years or so I shall be collecting material for it. If anyone asks me what I work at, I shall say, 'Collecting material'. No one can object to that.”

“The audience had run to beards and magenta shirts and original ways of arranging its neckwear; and not content with the ravages produced in its over-excitable nervous system by the remorseless workings of its critical intelligence, it had sat through a film of Japanese life called 'Yes,' made by a Norwegian film company in 1915 with Japanese actors, which lasted an hour and three-quarters and contained twelve close-ups of water-lilies lying perfectly still on a scummy pond and four suicides, all done extremely slowly.”

“Ah but' 'there'll be no butter in hell!”

“But she had a lively acquaintaince with confinement through the works of women novelists, especially those of the unmarried ones.”

“By the way, I adore my bedroom, but do you think I could have the curtains washed? I believe they are red; and I should so like to make sure.' Judith had sunk into a reverie. 'Curtains?' she asked, vacantly, lifting her magnificent head. 'Child, child, it is many years since such trifles broke across the web of my solitude'.”

“Haven't you enough money?'For she knew that this is what is the matter with nearly everybody over twenty-five.”

“... on the whole I thought I liked having everything very tidy and calm all around me, and not being bothered to do things, and laughing at the kind of joke other people didn't think at all funny, and going for country walks, and not being asked to express opinions about things (like love, and isn't so-and-so peculiar?)”

“Mrs Poste, who had wished people to live beautiful lives and yet be ladies and gentlemen.”

“Flora inherited, however, from her father a strong will and from her mother a slender ankle.”

“The life of a journalist is poor, nasty, brutish, and short. So is his style”

“One of the disadvantages of almost universal education was the fact that all kinds of persons acquired a familiarity with one's favorite writers. It gave one a curious feeling; it was like seeing a drunken stranger wrapped in one's dressing gown.”

“She liked Victorian novels. They were the only kind of novel you could read while eating an apple.”

“You have the most revolting Florence Nightingale complex,' said Mrs. Smiling.It is not that at all, and well you know it. On the whole, I dislike my fellow beings; I find them so difficult to understand. But I have a tidy mind and untidy lives irritate me. Also, they are uncivilized.”

“There have always been Starkadders at Cold Comfort Farm”

“I think it's degrading of you, Flora,' cried Mrs Smiling at breakfast. 'Do you truly mean that you don't ever want to work at anything?'Her friend replied after some thought: 'Well, when I am fifty-three or so I would like to write a novel as good as "Persuasion", but with a modern setting, of course. For the next thirty years or so I shall be collecting material for it. If anyone asks me what I work at, I shall say "Collecting material." No one can object to that. Besides, I shall be.'Mrs Smiling drank some coffee in silent disapproval.'If you ask me,' continued Flora, 'I think I have much in common with Miss Austen. She liked everything to be tidy and pleasant and comfortable around her, and so do I. You see Mary,' - and here Flora began to grow earnest and to wave one finger about - 'unless everything is tidy and pleasant and comfortable all about one, people cannot even begin to enjoy life. I cannot endure messes.”

“She glanced upwards for a second at the soft blue vault of the midsummer night sky. Not a cloud misted its solemn depths. Tomorrow would be a beautiful day.”

“The flies buzzed in answer above the dirty water standing in the washbasin, in which floated a solitary black hair. It, too, was like life-- and as meaningless.”

“Daisies opened in sly lust to the sun-rays and rain-spears, and eft-flies, locked in a blind embrace, spun radiantly through the glutinous light to their ordained death.”

“That would be delightful,' agreed Flora, thinking how nasty and boring it would be.”

“No one had seen anything of Urk since he had gone galloping out into the night carrying Meriam, the hired girl. It was generally assumed that he had drowned her and then himself. Who cared, anyway?”

“Richard had realized, not that Elfine was beautiful, but that he loved Elfine. (Young men frequently need this fact pointing out to them, as Flora knew by observing the antics of her friends.)”

“But Julia thought it would be a much better idea if they went to see Mr Dan Langham in 'On Your Toes!' at the New Hippodrome, so they went there instead and had a nice time instead of a nasty one.”

“Here was an occasion, she thought, for indulging in that deliberate rudeness which only persons with habitually good manners have the right to commit...”

“On the whole, Flora liked it better when they were silent, though it did rather give her the feeling that she was acting in one of the less cheerful German highbrow films.”

“Women are all alike-- aye fussin' over their fal-lals and bedazin' a man's eyes, when all they really want is man's blood and his heart out of his body and his soul and his pride....”

“...The Abbe's warning: 'Never confront an enemy at the end of a journey, unless it happens to be his journey'.”

“He was enmeshed in his grief. He did not notice that Graceless's leg had come off and that she was managing as best she could with three.”

“Well,' said Mrs Smiling, 'it sounds an appalling place, but in a different way from all the others. I mean, it does sound interesting and appalling, while the others just sound appalling.”

“A straight nose is a great help if one wishes to look serious'.”

“He was, she reflected, almost rudely like a tortoise; and she was glad her friend kept none as pets or they might have suspected mockery.”

“Like all really strong-minded women, on whom everybody flops, she adored being bossed about. It was so restful.”

“. . . And she said it was a pity, because my father was so “keen”, and what did I care about?So I said, well, I was not quite sure, but on the whole I thought I liked having everything very tidy and calm all around me, and not being bothered to do things, and laughing at the kind of joke other people didn’t think at all funny, and going for country walks, and not being asked to express opinions about things (like love, and isn’t so-and-so peculiar?). So then she said, oh, well, didn’t I think I could try to be a little less slack, because of Father, and I said no, I was I afraid I couldn’t; and after that she left me alone. But all the others still said I was no good.”

“I saw something nasty in the woodshed.”

“I do not object to the phenomena, but I do object to the parrot.”

“Nature is all very well in her place, but she must not be allowed to make things untidy.”