Craig Brown > Quotes

“Without anything being said, there were no women at our lunches. Not that we were talking pussy. Or not much. But it was a chaps thing. Seasoned observers all, we set the world, such as it was, to rights, offsetting our intellectual know-how with truly wondrous flights of fancy. It was at the time of the ruinous yet avoidable civil war in Angola, in which far too many people died, or, in our immortal parlance, became 'deadified.' It might have been anyone—actually, I [Christopher Hitchens] am sure it was our poet friend Craig Raine—who came up with the appalling yet unforgettable idea that there is a design flaw in the female form, and that the breasts and the buttocks really ought to be on the same side. For myself, I have oft been perplexed as to why our heads are where, in a truly just world, our penises really ought to be, and my arse is not located between my chin and my nose, allowing me mellifluously to talk out of it.”
― Craig Brown

“another of their acquaintances finds himself mesmerised by the way that he 'always had something of ... rivetting stupidity to say on any subject'.”
― Craig Brown, One on One

“One evening, at the time of the Six-Day War, I [Christopher Hitchens] had my wicked way with a lovely lady, who had earlier intimated that she did not perhaps find me entirely repulsive. We procured a decent room, as I remember, at the Cadogan Hotel. Perhaps a little flown with wine, I asked her to don a Martin Amis face mask which I had—with a combination of sticky tape, elastic bands, cardboard, and a much-treasured photograph—prepared earlier. The fair damsel was happy to oblige, and thus attired she permitted me to embark on the hugely agreeable pathway to libidinous fulfillment.”
― Craig Brown

“I [Christopher Hitchens] moved into Mart's sock—where you lived was your 'sock.' Your rug was your 'hair.' Your knee was still your knee: we couldn't think of another word for it. We called our penises our 'willie winkies' and our shared lavatory 'the bog.' There were a lot of brilliantly inventive word games of that kind. What if you changed 'heart' to 'dick' in any well-known song or phrase? Bury my dick at Wounded Knee. Dick-break Hotel. Don't go breaking my dick ... They may, in retrospect, seem infantile, but they built intellectual muscle and taught us all we knew about philosophy, psychology, and other -ologies too numerous (and humorous!) to mention. It was at the time of the wholly reprehensible bombing of Cambodia. These dazzling jests were part of the reason why, when Mart and I got together, nobody felt able to leave the room, or sock-toe. A glimpse, if you will, of another era, a time when Mr. Wilde had sparred so felicitously with Mr. Whistler across their effortlessly groaning table at the imperious Cafe Royal.”
― Craig Brown

“improbability is no barrier to gossip.”
― Craig Brown, Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret

“deep down, what Margaret really wanted from Elizabeth was approval.”
― Craig Brown, Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret

“love and duty speak two languages.”
― Craig Brown, Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret

“Yet, miraculously, the Queen has managed to avoid saying anything striking or memorable to anyone. This is an achievement, not a failing: it was her duty and destiny to be dull, to be as useful and undemonstrative as a postage stamp, her life dedicated to the near-impossible task of saying nothing of interest. Once, when Gore Vidal was gossiping with Princess Margaret, he told her that Jackie Kennedy had found the Queen ‘pretty heavy going’. ‘But that’s what she’s there for,’ explained the Princess.”
― Craig Brown, Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret

“Biography is at the mercy of information, and information about the Royal Family is seldom there when you want it. Or rather, there is a wealth of information, but most of it is window-dressing: the shop itself is shut, visible only through the front window, its private offices firmly under lock and key.”
― Craig Brown, Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret

“Lord Curzon who, accused of knowing nothing of the common man, jumped on a bus, then ordered it to take him to No. 1 Carlton House Terrace.”
― Craig Brown, Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret

“Giving money to the poor, she thought, somehow makes them less disciplined, and therefore less happy:”
― Craig Brown, Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret

“She looked at the world outside between the bars of her extremely comfortable cage.”
― Craig Brown, Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret

“Great Privileges imply Great Responsibilities,”
― Craig Brown, Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret

“she suffered from a perpetual identity crisis. She didn’t know who she was.”
― Craig Brown, Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret

“We are born in a clear field, and we die in a dark forest,’ goes the Russian proverb.”
― Craig Brown, Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret

“Remember, man, that thou art dust, and unto dust thou shalt return:”
― Craig Brown, Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret

“The people who knew her best were devoted to her. It was the fringe friends who could be so unpleasant.”
― Craig Brown, Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret

“Naylor puzzled for some time over how to incorporate 365 different forecasts into a single column, and eventually devised a more off-the-peg system by dividing the sun’s 360-degree transit into twelve zones, each of them spanning thirty degrees. He then named each of the twelve zones after a different celestial constellation, and offered blocks of predictions for each birth sign. This was how the modern horoscope came into being.”
― Craig Brown, Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret