Elizabeth Bowen
Elizabeth Bowen
Elizabeth Bowen, CBEwas an Anglo-Irish novelist and short story writer...
NationalityIrish
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth7 June 1899
CountryIreland
reading reading-novels novel
the slight sense of degeneracy induced by reading novels before luncheon
waste firsts littles
But to be quite oneself one must first waste a little time.
solitude looks elbows
Karen, her elbows folded on the deck-rail, wanted to share with someone the pleasure in being alone: this is the paradox of any happy solitude. She had never landed at Cork, so this hill and that hill beyond were as unexpected as pictures at which you say "Oh look!" Nobody was beside her to share the moment, which would have been imperfect with anyone else there.
writing people should
Dialogue should show the relationships among people.
clothes dresses reason
On the subject of dress almost no one, for one or another reason, feels truly indifferent: if their own clothes do not concern them, somebody else's do.
book reading people
Certain books come to meet me, as do people.
leap
to leap is not only to leap, it is to hit the ground somewhere.
stronger conventions
Convention was our safeguard: could one have stronger?
rome curiosity courtesy
Curiosity in Rome is a form of courtesy.
feelings moments driven
Wariness had driven away poetry; from hesitating to feel came the moment when you no longer could.
learning growth lessons
in my experience one thing you don't learn from is anything anyone set up to be a lesson; what you are to know you pick up as you go along.
home firsts succeed
A Bowen, in the first place, made Bowen's Court. Since then, with a rather alarming sureness, Bowen's Court has made all the succeeding Bowens.
ideas roots dandelions
Some ideas, like dandelions in lawns, strike tenaciously: you may pull off the top but the root remains, drives down suckers and may even sprout again.
sports mistake two
The Irish landowner, partly from laziness but also from an indifferent delicacy, does not interfere in the lives of the people round. Sport and death are the two great socializing factors in Ireland, but these cannot operate the whole time: on the whole, the landowner leaves his tenants and work-people to make their own mistakes, while he makes his.