Arnold Bennett

Enoch Arnold Bennett (27 May 1867 – 27 March 1931) was an English novelist and playwright.

Quotes

• Does there, I wonder, exist a being who has read all, or approximately all, that the person of average culture is supposed to have read, and that not to have read is a social sin? If such a being does exist, surely he is an old, a very old man.
  • The Journals of Arnold Bennett, ed. Newman Flower (pub. Cassell, 1932)

• The price of justice is eternal publicity.
  • Things That Have Interested Me, 2nd series (1923), "Secret Trials"

The Title (1918)

• A cause may be inconvenient, but it's magnificent. It's like champagne or high heels, and one must be prepared to suffer for it.
  • Act I

• Being a husband is a whole-time job. That is why so many husbands fail. They can't give their entire attention to it.
  • Act I

• Journalists say a thing that they know isn't true, in the hope that if they keep on saying it long enough it will be true.
  • Act II

How to Live on Twenty-Four Hours a Day (1910)

• Yes books are valuable. But not reading of books will take the place of a daily, candid, honest examination of what one has recently done, and what one is about to do - of a steady looking at one's self in the face (disconcerting though the sight may be).
  • Chapter 8.

• A prig is a pompous fool who has gone out for a ceremonial walk, and without knowing it has lost an important part of his attire, namely, his sense of humour.
  • Chapter 12.

• And, having once decided to achieve a certain task, achieve it at all costs of tedium and distaste. The gain in self-confidence of having accomplished a tiresome labour is immense.
  • Chapter 12.