Simon Bendle

“It was part of war; men died, more would die, that was past, and what mattered now was the business in hand; those who lived would get on with it. Whatever sorrow was felt, there was no point in talking or brooding about it, much less in making, for form’s sake, a parade of it. Better and healthier to forget it, and look to tomorrow.
The celebrated British stiff upper lip, the resolve to conceal emotion which is not only embarrassing and useless, but harmful, is just plain commons sense”
― George MacDonald Fraser, Quartered Safe Out Here: A Harrowing Tale of World War II

“We learn history not in order to know how to behave or how to succeed, but to know who we are.”
― Leszek Kolakowski

“People who can change and change again are so much more reliable and happier than those who can’t”
― Stephen Fry, Moab Is My Washpot

“I'm as religious as the next man - which is to say I'll keep in with the local parson for form's sake and read the lessons on feast-days because my tenants expect it, but I've never been fool enough to confuse religion with belief in God. That's where so many clergymen... go wrong”
― George MacDonald Fraser, Flashman in the Great Game