V. S. Pritchett

Well, youth is the period of assumed personalities and disguises. It is the time of the sincerely insincere.

How extraordinary it is that one feels most guilt about the sins one is unable to commit.

The secret of happiness is to find a congenial monotony.

The profoundly humorous writers are humorous because they are responsive to the hopeless uncouth concatenations of life.

In our family, as far as we are concerned, we were born and what happened before that is myth.

Life - how curious is that habit that makes us think it is not here, but elsewhere.

The Canadian spirit is cautious, observant and critical where the American is assertive.