Ivy Compton-Burnett

I don't mind about being laughed at any more. Isn't it funny? Probably I'm being hated instead.

“We can make quite a useful world out of our imagination. I don’t know why falsehood does not do as well as truth.”
“It often does better; that is why it is used instead.”

Gun Hu, Cat Scratching, Joseon Period (1392-1910)

Gun Hu, Cat Scratching, Joseon Period (1392-1910)

I’ve been let into a sorry muddle.

Well, don’t keep harping on it. A muddle is not any better because it is sorry. The sorrier, the worse, in my humble imagination.

“I believe you are a feminist, Mr. Bacon,” said Miss Luke, her tone hardly bearing out her own opinions.
“He is indeed,” said Helen. “He said that it was not settled that women were subordinate to men, and he could not be more of a feminist than that.”

[One of Ivy’s two IMDB credits.]

The judgement of posterity is known to be the only true one. So there seems no point in getting any other. I wonder so many people do it. You seem to be very wise.

Labor Day weekend 🔥

Ivy Compton Burnett, UCONN, Frank Pepe's White Clam

“I am not an ogress.”
“Well, you are rather. That is why I feel it my duty to come between the two of you.”

I shall come home to you a tired bread-winner. I suppose I am a bread-winner, even if all the bread I win is for myself. Breadwinners’ own bread hardly seems to count.

Bare minimum for holding a conversation: Ivy Compton-Burnett

You are not a fiend, and neither am I; so it is no good our pretending, convenient though it might be. And don’t keep looking at me as if I were one. You have been adopting that expression for some time, and it is the reverse of becoming.

“A wedding upsets me,” said Miss Munday. “I am very sentimental.”
“So it does me,” said Felix.
“Well, do you know, so it does me,” said Josephine. “I cannot explain it, but there it is.”
“I can explain it,” said Felix; “but I do not think I will.”
“I explained it,” said Miss Munday.

“We feel that the bride and bridegroom care more for each other, than anyone cares for us,” said Helen.
“I do not feel that,” said Josephine. “You must find some other explanation for me.”

Ah, Elizabeth had her ways. A leopard does not change its spots, or change his feeling that spots are rather a credit. Well, women of her kind have a right to put their gifts to their natural use. We must not find fault with what is natural.

“I make no claim to your elegant appearance. I am content with my own type.”
“We most of us are,” said Felix. “I am myself. It is the oddest thing in life.”
“Now, what exactly do you mean by that?”
“Not at all what you thought I meant. How could you have thought I meant it?”

And he and his good friend Barbara Pym used to write each other letters in the style of Ivy Compton-Burnett!

“You ought to marry, and find scope for your gifts as a family man.”
“Please do not look at me with a masculine expression. I may not have the power of making a woman happy.”

“A woman asks very little beyond a home and a husband.”
“She could not ask for a home from me. My father would have to offer her his; and I do not see how she could be happy with my father.”
“I suppose your mother was happy with him.”
“Why do you suppose that?” said Felix.

[So anti-fascist activist Natalia Ginzburg, BOTD in 1916, approached family relationships, in her novels, under the influence of Ivy! And, she played Mary of Bethany in Pasolini's IL VANGELO SECONDO MATTEO (1964)!]

The judgement of posterity is known to be the only true one. So there seems no point in getting any other. I wonder so many people do it. You seem to be very wise.

“My figure is remarkably supple and lithe,” he said. “But when my father treats me as if I had the gift of perennial youth, I do not believe he is thinking about my figure.”

"My father should have had a daughter.”
“Does he wish he had had a daughter?”
“Yes. He says he would have found one a consolation. He says too, that I might be a woman, for all the difference he can see. That seems to show that I have tried to be a comfort to him.”

And things like poverty and old age and death are shameful. We cannot help them; but that is the humiliation. To accept conditions that would not be your choice must be a disgrace.

“Well, I suppose we have no reason for objecting to the presence of our fellow creatures,” said Josephine, continuing in Miss Luke’s line.
“I had reasons for objecting to the presence of these creatures. And I don’t know why they were my fellows: I saw no basis of fellowship.”

Yes, very pleasant, thank you. The train was rather crowded. But I see no reason myself for objecting to the presence of my fellow creatures. It is extraordinary how seldom we meet unpleasant people, or see an unpleasant face. Have you ever met a repulsive person, Mrs. Napier? I think I have not.

"It is tiresome of exceptions to prove rules," said Miss Burtenshaw.

"In a way we are safe. What incredible things happen in this house!"
"Nothing can happen to us outside it. We have no life elsewhere."

I have been so ashamed of being alive and well, and having to be housed and clothed and fed and provided for. It really is not reasonable. No wonder phrases like “vile bodies” arise. When people have to be provided for, death is the only thing.