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1 " What was he doing with her? How on earth could he love her? But he did. Or, at least, she made him feel sick, sad, and distracted. Perhaps there was another way of describing that unique and useless combination of feelings, but “love” would have to do for now. "
― Nick Hornby , Funny Girl
2 " She began to fear that she would always be greedy, all the time. Nothing ever seemed to fill her up. Nothing ever seemed to touch the sides. "
3 " opinion. Love meant being brave, otherwise you had already lost your own argument: the man who couldn’t tell a woman he loved her was, by definition, not worthy of her. "
4 " They’d been told, several times, by colleagues … that the sea was warmer over there [abroad], and the skies bluer, and the food was like nothing you could buy in London no matter how much you spent. But none of those colleagues had done what Tony had wanted to do when he got back: grab people by the lapels and shout at them, wide-eyed, until they agreed to book tickets. Most people in England, he thought, had no idea that within a few hours they could be somewhere that would make them begrudge every single second they’d ever spent in Hastings or Shegness or the Lake District. "
5 " What a terrible thing an education was, he thought, if it produced the kind of mind that despised entertainment and the people who valued it. "
6 " She sat down next to him, took one of his cigarettes, listened to his apologies. He was distraught, of course: he was just the kind of idiot who could only understand what things meant by doing them first. "
7 " Love meant being brave, otherwise you had already lost your own argument: the man who couldn’t tell a woman he loved her was, by definition, not worthy of her. "
8 " Years later, Tony would discover that writers never felt they belonged anywhere. That was one of the reasons they became writers. It was strange, however, failing to belong even at a party full of outsiders. "
9 " he was disappointed that he’d never quite added up to as much as the results of his own calculations. The trouble was that he’d got his sums all wrong, but she didn’t want to be the one to tell him that. "
10 " She didn't think she'd ever shown enough gratitude for the quick wits of the people she worked with, and if the evening ever ended, which it showed no signs of doing, she would rectify that. She would buy them all flowers or whisky and write a card thanking them for being so clever. "
11 " They already knew that they would be telling people about the morning for a long time to come, maybe for the rest of their lives, and the taxi ride was the first attempt at a first draft of a story that would have to satisfy parents, siblings, children, and grandchildren. "
12 " Clive was rapidly coming to the conclusion that being engaged to somebody meant that he spent an awful lot of time not doing things he wanted to do. "
13 " I’ve never been happy in the way that I’ve been happy in this room, and in the studios,” said Sophie. “I’ve never laughed so much, or learned so much, and everything I know about my job is because of the people here. Even you, Clive. And I’m worried that I’ll spend the rest of my working life looking for an experience like this one, where everything clicks and everyone pushes you to do the best you can, better than anything you think you’re capable of. "
14 " He was distraught, of course: he was just the kind of idiot who could only understand what things meant by doing them first. "
15 " But Tony was a storyteller, and he knew that if you looked at any narrative closely enough you could trace the unraveling back and back and back—right to the very beginning, if the story was good enough. "
16 " He was kind, he was single, he was vulnerable, he made her laugh (not always intentionally, true, but often enough). Every time she saw him, he seemed to have become a little more handsome. "
17 " [-] writers never felt they belonged anywhere. That was one of the reasons they became writers. "
18 " The anger was clearly real, though. It was in there, sloshing around, looking for the nearest hole to escape through. "
19 " He was thinking about Edith. She was constantly on the verge of canceling their marriage. She would only commission a few shows at a time, reluctantly, and if he had listened properly, she’d always been telling him that it would all end one day. "
20 " She thought she’d focus on the compliment, rather than the terrifying glimpse she’d been given into her flatmate’s soul. She found herself particularly worried by Marjorie’s willingness to do all that, the slicing and the bleeding and the murdering, for only a percentage of the advantages she envied. There was something in this compromise that made it seem more real than Barbara wanted it to be. "
