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There is always time for failure

John Mortimer

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John Mortimer
Age: 85 †
Born: 1923
Born: April 21
Died: 2009
Died: January 16
Barrister
Novelist
Poet Lawyer
Screenwriter
Writer
Hampstead Village
Sir John Clifford Mortimer
Sir John Mortimer
John Clifford Mortimer
Failure
Always
Time

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Like childhood, old age is irresponsible, reckless, and foolhardy. Children and old people have everything to gain and nothing much to lose. It's middle-age which is cursed by the desperate need to cling to some finger-hold halfway up the mountain, to conform, not to cause trouble, to behave well.
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I had inherited what my father called the art of the advocate, or the irritating habit of looking for the flaw in any argument.
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The people look forbidding, solemn, marked by that impossible ideal, Communism, which, like Christianity, seemed to demand too much of humanity and, falling into the wrong hands, led too easily to horrible brutality.
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I suppose true sexual equality will come when a general called Anthea is found having an unwise lunch with a young, unreliable model from Spain.
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I suppose that writers should, in a way, feel flattered by the censorship laws. They show a primitive fear and dread at the fearful magic of print.
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The only rule I have found to have any validity in writing is not to bore yourself.
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I knew nothing about farce until I read Puce a l'Oreille, and had no idea what a deadly serious business it is.
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We may not be the creme de la creme, but we are the creme de la scum.
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All the flower children were as alike as a congress of accountants and about as interesting.
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I refuse to spend my life worrying about what I eat. There is no pleasure worth foregoing just for an extra three years in the geriatric ward.
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Dying is a matter of slapstick and pratfalls. The ageing process is not gradual or gentle. It rushes up, pushes you over and runs off laughing. No one should grow old who isn't ready to appear ridiculous.
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I don't think you ever feel a success really because everything could always be done better than you've done it.
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A war against terrorism is an impracticable conception if it means fighting terrorism with terrorism.
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When... I told my father I wanted to be a writer, he had asked me to consider my unfortunate wife, who would have me about the house all day 'wearing a dressing gown, brewing tea and stumped for words'.
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Success is good for the character.
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I found criminal clients easy and matrimonial clients hard. Matrimonial clients hate each other so much and use their children to hurt each other in beastly ways. Murderers have usually killed the one person in the world that was bugging them and they're usually quite peaceful and agreeable.
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Farce is tragedy played at a thousand revolutions per minute.
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What obsesses a writer starting out on a lifetime's work is the panic-stricken search for a voice of his own.
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Marriage is like pleading guilty to an indefinite sentence. Without parole.
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Never believe a rumour until you hear it officially denied.
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