Quotes by Simon Raven

About Simon Raven:

Simon Arthur Noël Raven was an English novelist, essayist, dramatist and raconteur who, in a writing career of forty years, caused controversy, amusement and offence. His obituary in The Guardian noted that, "he combined elements of Flashman, Waugh's Captain Grimes and the Earl of Rochester", and that he reminded Noel Annan, his Cambridge tutor, of the young Guy Burgess.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Nobody minded what you did in bed or what you said about God, a very civilized attitude in 1948.

Simon Raven

And so, at the age of thirty, I had successively disgraced myself with three fine institutions, each of which had made me free of its full and rich resources, had trained me with skill and patience, and had shown me nothing but forbearance and charit...

Simon Raven

I wanted to look at the upper-middle-class scene since the war, and in particular my generation's part in it. We had spent our early years as privileged members of a privileged class. How were we faring in the Age of the Common Man? How ought we to b...

Simon Raven

Scholarship was one thing, drudgery another. I very soon concluded that nothing would induce me to read, let alone make notes on, hundreds and hundreds of very, very, very boring books.

Simon Raven

Art for art's sake, money for God's sake.

Simon Raven

Gentlemen can now only behave as such, or be tolerated as such, in circumstances that are manifestly contrived or unreal.

Simon Raven

I loved the Army as an institution and loathed every single thing it required me to do.

Simon Raven

...dusk is the time when men whisper of matters about which they remain silent in the full light of the sun.

Simon Raven

How can I go on with this? Please God, let me win a football pool.

Simon Raven

Author Bio

  • NameSimon Raven
  • DescriptionBritish writer
  • BornDecember 28, 1927
  • DiedMay 12, 2001
  • ProfessionNovelist