Quote

There's more of yourself in a book than a play. that's why we know all about Dickens and not much about Shakespeare. Ben Jonson murdered people Marlowe was a spy Shakespeare just sat in the corner and took notes.

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
People
Sat
Corner
Corners
Notes
Marlowe
Took
Murdered
Book
Spy
Play
Dickens
Much
Shakespeare

More quotes by John Mortimer

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My father, to whom I owe so much, never told me the difference between right and wrong now I think that's why I remain so greatly in his debt.
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Marriage is like pleading guilty to an indefinite sentence. Without parole.
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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 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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A war against terrorism is an impracticable conception if it means fighting terrorism with terrorism.
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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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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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No brilliance is needed in the law. Nothing but common sense, and relatively clean finger nails.
John Mortimer
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Check-ups are, in my experience, a grave mistake all they do is allow the quack of your choice to tell you that you have some sort of complaint that you were far happier not knowing about.
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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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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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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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Hell must be a place where you are only allowed to read what you agree with.
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The point at which beliefs meet may be more significant, more useful to contemplate, than their sources.
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There is always time for failure
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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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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 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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The officers of the branch of the Force (the Obscene Publications Squad) have a discouraging club tie, on which a book is depicted being cut in half by a larger pair of scissors.
John Mortimer
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Never believe a rumour until you hear it officially denied.
John Mortimer