List of P. D. James Quotes

Most Of My Life I Have Needed More Time To Be On My Own.

I Learned Early And At That Kitchen Table That There Are Ways Of Avoiding, Without Guilt, The Commitments Of Love.

The Weekend Break Had Begun With The Usual Resentment And Had Continued With Half-repressed Ill Humour. It Was, Of Course, His Fault. He Had Been More Ready To Hurt His Wife's Feelings And Deprive His Daughter Than Inconvenience A Pub Bar Full Of Strangers. He Wished There Could Be One Memory Of His Dead Child Which Wasn't Tainted With Guilt And Regret.

In 1930s Mysteries, All Sorts Of Motives Were Credible Which Aren't Credible Today, Especially Motives Of Preventing Guilty Sexual Secrets From Coming Out. Nowadays, People Sell Their Guilty Sexual Secrets.

Children Live In Occupied Territory. The Brave And The Foolhardy Openly Rebel Against Authority, Whether Harsh Or Benign. But Most Tread Warily, Outwardly Accommodating Themselves To Alien Mores And Edicts While Living In Secret Their Iconoclastic And Subversive Lives.

A Picnic May Well Be A Metaphor For Life. The Essentials For Happiness Are The Right Company, Moderate If Sanguine Expectations And A Reasonable Standard Of Physical Sustenance And Comfort, The Whole Being Bedeviled By The Belief That There Is Always Something Better To Be Had If Only One Presses On.

Without The Hope Of Posterity, For Our Race If Not For Ourselves, Without The Assurance That We Being Dead Yet Live, All Pleasures Of The Mind And Senses Sometimes Seem To Me No More Than Pathetic And Crumbling Defences Shored Up Against Our Ruin.

Read Widely And With Discrimination. Bad Writing Is Contagious.

The Secret Of Contentment Is Never To Allow Yourself To Want Anything Which Reason Tells You You Haven't A Chance Of Getting.

Perhaps It's Only When People Are Dead That We Can Safely Show How Much We Cared About Them. We Know That It's Too Late Then For Them To Do Anything About It.

Read Widely, Not In Order To Copy Someone Else's Style, But To Learn To Appreciate And Recognize Good Writing And To See How The Best Writers Have Achieved Their Result. Poor Writing Is, Unfortunately, Infectious And Should Be Avoided.

There Is No Point In Regretting Any Part Of The Past. The Past Can't Now Be Altered, The Future Has Yet To Be Lived, And Consciously To Experience Every Moment Of The Present Is The Only Way To Gain At Least The Illusion Of Immortality.