V.S. Pritchett Quotes

Sir Victor Sawdon Pritchett was a British writer and literary critic.

Pritchett was known particularly for his short stories, collated in a number of volumes. His non-fiction works include the memoirs A Cab at the Door and Midnight Oil , and many collections of essays on literary biography and criticism. Wikipedia  

✵ 16. December 1900 – 20. March 1997   •   Other names Sir Victor Sawdon Pritchett
V.S. Pritchett: 23   quotes 0   likes

Famous V.S. Pritchett Quotes

“Like many popular best-sellers, he was a very sad and solemn man who took himself too seriously and his art not seriously enough.”

"Rider Haggard: Still Riding", p. 25
The Tale Bearers: English and American Writers (1980)

V.S. Pritchett Quotes about people

“Now, practically all reviewers have academic aspirations. The people from the universities are used to a captive audience, but the literary journalist has to please his audience.”

As quoted in "V.S. Pritchett Himself" http://www.nytimes.com/books/00/06/18/specials/theroux-pritchett.html?_r=1&oref=slogin by Paul Theroux in The New York Times (22 May 1977)

“All great things, in our time, can only be seen in fragments, by fragmentary people.”

Source: London Perceived (1962), Ch. 5, p. 162
Context: Mass society destroys the things it is told are its inheritance. It is rarely possible to see the Abbey without being surrounded by thousands of tourists from all over the world. Like St. Peter's at Rome, it has been turned into a sinister sort of railway terminal. The aisles are as crowded as the pavements of Oxford Street or the alleys of a large shop, imagination is jostled, awe dispersed, and the mind never at rest. All great things, in our time, can only be seen in fragments, by fragmentary people.

“I found people were telling stories to themselves without knowing it.”

As quoted in "V.S. Pritchett's Century" (1990) by Martin Amis; later included in Visiting Mrs. Nabokov and Other Excursions (1993) by Martin Amis, p. 272
Context: I found people were telling stories to themselves without knowing it. It seemed to me that people were living a sort of small sermon that they believed in, but at the same time it was a fairy tale. Selfish desires, along with one or two highly suspect elevated thoughts. They secretly regard themselves as works of art, valuable in themselves.

V.S. Pritchett Quotes

“Mass society destroys the things it is told are its inheritance.”

Source: London Perceived (1962), Ch. 5, p. 162
Context: Mass society destroys the things it is told are its inheritance. It is rarely possible to see the Abbey without being surrounded by thousands of tourists from all over the world. Like St. Peter's at Rome, it has been turned into a sinister sort of railway terminal. The aisles are as crowded as the pavements of Oxford Street or the alleys of a large shop, imagination is jostled, awe dispersed, and the mind never at rest. All great things, in our time, can only be seen in fragments, by fragmentary people.

“One recalls how much the creative impulse of the best-sellers depends upon self-pity. It is an emotion of great dramatic potential.”

"Rider Haggard: Still Riding", p. 28
The Tale Bearers: English and American Writers (1980)

“It's very important to feel foreign. I was born in England, but when I'm being a writer, everyone in England is foreign to me.”

Quoted in " How Did I Do That? http://www.nytimes.com/books/98/12/06/specials/pritchett-complete.html" by Deborah Stead, in The New York Times (24 March 1991)

“Wilson was not, in the academic sense, a scholar or historian. He was an enormous reader, one of those readers who are perpetually on the scent from book to book. He was the old-style man of letters, but galvanized and with the iron of purpose in him.”

V. S. Pritchett, The Tale Bearers: English and American Writers (1980) [Random House, ISBN 0-394-74683-X], "Edmund Wilson: Towards Revolution," p. 141
The Tale Bearers: English and American Writers (1980)

“There is more magic in sin if it is not committed.”

"Rudyard Kipling: A Pre-Raphaelite's Son", p. 36
The Tale Bearers: English and American Writers (1980)

“Yes, well I had all my serious illnesses in late middle age. And now I'm just stuck, I'm afraid.”

As quoted in "V.S. Pritchett's Century" (1990) by Martin Amis; later included in Visiting Mrs. Nabokov and Other Excursions (1993) by Martin Amis, p. 265

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