Michael Whiteway

“The world has never been fair, and cannot be made fair, and claims that it can are foolish or dishonest. It can be made fairer and attempts to make it less fair can be resisted. Optimistic realists seek improvement, not perfection.”
― David Mitchell, Unruly: A History of England’s Kings and Queens

“As to secrets, Father, I have but one: if the congregation expects a sermon of forty minutes’ length, then give them one of thirty minutes. If they expect thirty, then give them twenty. In all my years as a rabbi, I have never once had a soul complain to me that a sermon was too short.”
― Geraldine Brooks, People of the Book

“When Sam Lyall was settled in his crease and had taken guard, Bates halted Fletcher while he bought the close off-fielders a pace or two in. Sam Lyall watched this, unperturbed. Reared in a wasting patrimony, and having watched its continuing decline during his own seniority, he had long resigned himself to the defeat and decay of the things which he held dear. They were going to lose this match, anyway, as they had lost the land to the development area, as they were losing the Holts and the Lowill field. His determination remained as high, but his hopes were non-existent. Bates could have his fielders sitting on the edge of the popping crease —it made no difference.”
― William Godfrey, The Friendly Game

“… but to the girl it naturally seemed evidence of a great and romantic soul. Nobody, she felt, could look so grave and sad, had he not hidden deeps in him.”
― P.G. Wodehouse, Mulliner Nights