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Doing is overrated, and success undesirable, but the bitterness of failure even more so.

Cyril Connolly

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Cyril Connolly
Age: 71 †
Born: 1903
Born: September 10
Died: 1974
Died: November 26
Critic
Literary Critic
Novelist
Writer
Coventry
England
UK
Cyril Vernon Connolly
Overrated
Bitterness
Failure
Success
Even
Undesirable

More quotes by Cyril Connolly

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From now on - specialize never again make any concession to the ninety-nine percent of you which is like everyon else at the expense of the one percent which is unique.
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We create the world in which we live if that world becomes unfit for human life, it is because we tire of our responsibility.
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There is no fury like an ex-wife searching for a new lover.
Cyril Connolly
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There is no pain equal to that which two lovers can inflict on one another. This should be made clear to all who contemplate such a union. The avoidance of this pain is the beginning of wisdom, for it is strong enough to contaminate the rest of our lives.
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A woman's desire for revenge outlasts all her other emotions.
Cyril Connolly
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There is no pain equal to that which two lovers can inflict on one another.
Cyril Connolly
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The true function of a writer is to produce a masterpiece and no other task is of any consequence.
Cyril Connolly
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The artist secretes nostalgia around life.
Cyril Connolly
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The secret of success is to be in harmony with existence, to be always calm to let each wave of life wash us a little farther up the shore.
Cyril Connolly
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No-one was ever made wretched in a brothel.
Cyril Connolly
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We fear something before we hate.
Cyril Connolly
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The shock, for an intelligent writer, of discovering for the first time that there are people younger than himself who think him stupid is severe.
Cyril Connolly
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Literature is the art of writing something that will be read twice journalism what will be grasped at once.
Cyril Connolly
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Imprisoned in every fat man a thin one is wildly signalling to be let out.
Cyril Connolly
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Whom the gods wish to destroy they first call promising.
Cyril Connolly
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Beautiful women must think about their beauty as capitalists think about their investments or politicians about their majorities it is all they have to insure their places in the world.
Cyril Connolly
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It is a mistake to expect good work from expatriates for it is not what they do that matters but what they are not doing.
Cyril Connolly
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Happiness lies in the fulfillment of the spirit through the body.
Cyril Connolly
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Like the bee its sting, the promiscuous leave behind them in each encounter something of themselves by which they are made to suffer.
Cyril Connolly
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An author arrives at a good style when his language performs what is required of it without shyness.
Cyril Connolly