Helen Cresswell Quotes

“Ordinary Jack, that’s me. It’s what they should’ve christened me- Ordinary Jack Matthew Bagthorpe- with an e.”

″‘If you could do anything in the world this afternoon, what would you do?’ enquired Uncle Parker, his eyes still closed... ‘Be immortal,’ said Jack promptly. ‘Bit pointless,’ observed Uncle Parker.”

″‘You’re immortal if your name gets put on cups and shields,’ thought Jack moodily. ‘I’ll never be immortal.‘”

“You must have the courage of your convictions, Jack, old lad. If you mean ‘Pooh!’ then you must say ‘Pooh!’ and the devil take the consequences.”

“He even knew that they were all fond of him, in their own way. ‘But more as if I was a kind of pet, or something,’ he thought. ‘As if I’m just harmless. Not as an equal. I want to be equal.‘”

“Mother and Father both say we should be proud of achievement. They say it’s an inbred fault of the English to underestimate themselves. Their favourite sin is ‘pride that apes humility.‘”

″‘What’s SD? Stone Deaf?’ ‘Selectively Deaf. You hear, in effect, just as much as you wish to hear. And I am bound to say that if I were married to a lady who talks like your grandmother does, I should be SD- very much so.‘”

″‘No good just lying back and giving up, you know.’ ‘I haven’t given up. I’m trying to go into a trance.‘”

″‘They don’t look like geniuses,’ Jack thought, not for the first time. ‘Just like anybody else’s brother and sisters they look.‘”

“A veil of secrecy must be preserved.”