He was not at all what is called ‘a character’. He was an innocent, affable old man who had somehow preserved his good humor – much more than that, a mysterious and tranquil joy – throughout a life which to all outward observation had been overloaded with misfortune. Furthermore, he had like many another been born in full sunlight and lived to see night fall.

— Evelyn Waugh

I am reading Proust for the first time. Very poor stuff. I think he was mentally defective.

— Evelyn Waugh

I am sorry to disturb you,' said James politely, 'but these people wished to shoot us.

— Evelyn Waugh

If it could only be like this always – always summer, always alone, the fruit always ripe and Aloysius in a good temper...

— Evelyn Waugh

If she looked further than the wedding, it was to see marriage as the beginning of individual existence, this skirmish from which one's spurs, from which one set out on the true quests of life.

— Evelyn Waugh

I have a good mind not to take Aloysius to Venice. I don't want him to meet a lot of horrid Italian bears and pick up bad habits.

— Evelyn Waugh

I knew it all, the whole drab compass of marital disillusion; we had been through it together, the Army and me, from the first importunate courtship until now, when nothing remained to us except the chill bonds of law and duty and custom. I had played every scene in the domestic tragedy, had found the early tiffs become more frequent, the tears less affecting, the reconciliations less sweet, tell they engendered a mood of aloofness and cool criticism, and the growing conviction that it was not myself but the loved one who was at fault. Furthermore, I caught the false notes in her voice and learned to listen for them apprehensively; I recognized the blank, resentful stare of incomprehension in her eyes, and the selfish, hard set of the corners of her mouth. Furthermore, I learned her, as one must learn a woman one has kept house with, day in, day out, for three and a half years; I learned her slatternly ways, the routine and mechanism of her charm, her jealousy and self-seeking, and her nervous trick with the fingers when she was lying. She was stripped of all enchantment now, and I knew her for an uncongenial stranger to whom I had bound myself indissolubly in a moment of folly.

— Evelyn Waugh

I knew it all, the whole drab compass of marital disillusion; we had been through it together, the Army and me, from the first importunate courtship until now, when nothing remained to us except the chill bonds of law and duty and custom. I had played every scene in the domestic tragedy, had found the early tiffs become more frequent, the tears less affecting, the reconciliations less sweet, till they engendered a mood of aloofness and cool criticism, and the growing conviction that it was not myself but the loved one who was at fault. Furthermore, I caught the false notes in her voice and learned to listen for them apprehensively; I recognized the blank, resentful stare of incomprehension in her eyes, and the selfish, hard set of the corners of her mouth. Furthermore, I learned her, as one must learn a woman one has kept house with, day in, day out, for three and a half years; I learned her slatternly ways, the routine and mechanism of her charm, her jealousy and self-seeking, and her nervous trick with the fingers when she was lying. She was stripped of all enchantment now, and I knew her for an uncongenial stranger to whom I had bound myself indissolubly in a moment of folly.

— Evelyn Waugh

I know I am awful. But how much more awful I should be without the Faith.

— Evelyn Waugh

I'll pray for you."" That's very kind of you."" I can't spare you a whole rosary, you know. Just a decade. I've got such a long list of people. I take them in order, and they get a decade about once a week.

— Evelyn Waugh