One always tends to overpraise a long book, because one has got through it.

So Two cheers for Democracy: one because it admits variety and two because it permits criticism. Two cheers are quite enough: there is no occasion to give three. Only Love the Beloved Republic deserves that.

 

If I had to choose between betraying my country and betraying my friend, I hope I should have the guts to betray my country.

 

Only connect! … Only connect the prose and the passion.

 

Pathos, piety, courage—they exist, but are identical, and so is filth. Everything exists, nothing has value.

 

Railway termini. They are our gates to the glorious and the unknown. Through them we pass out into adventure and sunshine, to them, alas! we return.

 

It is a period between two wars—the long week-end it has been called.

 

Yes—oh dear yes—the novel tells a story.

 

Let us define a plot. We have defined a story as a narrative of events arranged in their time-sequence. A plot is also a narrative of events, the emphasis falling on causality. “The king died and then the queen died,” is a story. “The king died, and then the queen died of grief,” is a plot.