When I joined the militia I had promised myself to kill one Fascist - after all, if each of us killed one they would soon be extinct.

At any given moment there is an orthodoxy, a body of ideas of which it is assumed that all right-thinking people will accept without question. It is not exactly forbidden to say this, that or the other, but it is 'not done' to say it... Anyone who challenges the prevailing orthodoxy finds himself silenced with surprising effectiveness. A genuinely unfashionable opinion is almost never given a fair hearing, either in the popular press or in the high-brow periodicals.

Happiness can only exist in acceptance.

Do you know why you’re here? Shall I tell you why we brought you here? To cure you.To make you sane.

Tragedy, he precieved, belonged to the ancient time, to a time when there were still privacy, love, and friendship, and when the members of a family stood by one another without needing to know the reason.

If there really is such a thing as turning in one's grave, Shakespeare must get a lot of exercise.

In places this book is a little over-written, because Mr Blunden is no more able to resist a quotation than some people are to refuse a drink.