Ivy Compton-Burnett

“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.

At a certain point my novels set. They set just as hard as that jam jar. And then I know they are finished.

—Ivy Compton-Burnett

#AuthorInspiration

Robert Liddell’s ELIZABETH AND IVY is an excellent book, well worth snapping up if you can find it. 💙📚

It gives a fascinating account of Liddell's friendships with Elizabeth Taylor & Ivy Compton-Burnett, including extracts from letters.

My thoughts here:
jacquiwine.wordpress.com/2024/06/20/e...

[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."

yeah that is just not how it generally works

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.

“The wrong is never the only thing a wrong-doer has done,” said Cassie. "That is the pathos of criminals. No class has a greater."

How difficult it would be, if people did not die! Think of the numbers who die, and all the good that is done! They never seem to die, without doing something for someone. No wonder they hate so to do it, and plan to be immortal.

Other people’s troubles are what they deserve. Ah, how they deserve them!

"It is true that tragedy arouses pity and terror," said Nance. "In me terror is getting the upper hand."

I just said this to a friend yesterday! #NYRBWomen25

#NYRBWomen25

"Would you like to lose Nance and Cassie’s friendship?"
"No friendship that is lost has ever been worth having."

Horace felt that an argument ended in his favour, when his opponent wept, and as he always pursued one to this point, had no experience of defeat in words.

Her shabby, best dress, handed down for daily use, was scanty on her frame, and she wore her mended stockings and shoes as if they were on her mind. Her look at her father might have been one of aversion, if it had been possible; and it was possible.

only wes anderson could adapt ivy compton-burnett

"Well, Nance," said Mrs Bode, "I remember you the heroine of a like occasion, as if it were yesterday."
"People who remember things, always remember them as if they were yesterday," said Cassie. "I remember it as if it were twenty-six years ago."

One day the fierce wolf that walks by my side will spring on you and rip your abominable guts out.

"We are supposed to make a new beginning," said Nance. "I find the ending enough."
"Mother would wish us to start again," said her sister.
"I could not bear people to do that, directly I was dead," said Grant. "It would ruin my life after death to find they were doing it."