J. B. Priestley
J. B. Priestley
John Boynton Priestley, OM, was an English author, novelist, playwright, scriptwriter, social commentator, man of letters and broadcaster...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionWriter
Date of Birth13 September 1894
philosophy character civilization
California, that advance post of our civilization, with its huge aircraft factories, TV and film studios, automobile way of life... its flavourless cosmopolitanism, its charlatan philosophies and religions, its lack of anything old and well-tried rooted in tradition and character.
inspirational men risk
Many a man is praised for his reserve and so-called shyness when he is simply too proud to risk making a fool of himself.
clever too-much young-writers
There are plenty of clever young writers. But there is too much genius, not enough talent.
letting-go children imagination
Childhood, catching our imagination when it is fresh and tender, never lets go of us.
church england ends
It is hard to tell where the MCC ends and the Church of England begins.
men schizophrenic western
Western man is schizophrenic.
husband women wife
A loving wife will do anything for her husband except stop criticizing him and trying to improve him.
light shadow world
No matter how piercing and appalling his insights, the desolation creeping over his outer world, the lurid lights and shadows of his inner world, the writer must live with hope, work in faith
soccer football player
Nearly everything possible had been done to spoil the game: the heavy financial interest; the absurd transfer and player-selling system; the lack of any birth or residential qualifications; the absurd publicity given to every feature of it by the press; the monstrous partisanships of the crowds.
men differences together
The Canadian is often a baffled man because he feels different from his British kindred and his American neighbours, sharply refused to be lumped together with either of them, yet cannot make plain his difference.
body responsible members
We are members of one body. We are responsible for each other.
age mystery existence
The greatest writers of this age... are aware of the mystery of our existence.
lonely typewriters history
There is romance, the genuine glinting stuff, in typewriters, and not merely in their development from clumsy giants into agile dwarfs, but in the history of their manufacture, which is filled with raids, battles, lonely pioneers, great gambles, hope, fear, despair, triumph. If some of our novels could be written by the typewriters instead of on them, how much better they would be.
civilization skills use
The world we know at present is in no fit state to take over the dreariest little meteor ... If we have the courage and patience, the energy and skill, to take us voyaging to other planets, then let us use some of these to tidy up and civilize this earth. One world at a time, please.