Nutshells

“You know, there’s no way to transform someone into an activist without making it personal for them, without making it a selfish issue,” she says. “There’s no way of saying this is something you ought to do for these other people. The only way to make it convincing is to make it personal.”

I guess my “luck” has usually been people...

It is an unwritten law of the Navy that facilities must always be locked when they are most needed.

... the trouble with “lessons from history” is that we usually read them best after falling flat on our chins.

This is silly, of course; you don’t win a war by defense but by attack—no “Department of Defense” ever won a war; see the histories.

Girls are simply wonderful. Just to stand on a corner and watch them going past is delightful. They don’t walk. At least not what we do when we walk. I don’t know how to describe it, but it’s much more complex and utterly delightful. They don’t move just their feet; everything moves and in different directions . . . and all of it graceful.

I had an unsettling feeling that I had been completely mistaken as to the very nature of the world I was in, as if every part of it was something wildly different from what it appeared to be—like discovering that your own mother isn’t anyone you’ve ever seen before, but a stranger in a rubber mask.

... the orders you get aren’t impossible, they merely seem so because they nearly are.

I made a very important discovery at Camp Currie. Happiness consists in getting enough sleep.

Besides, lawyers make notoriously bad husbands, from their habit of incessant prating; whereas your sailor has been schooled to mute obedience,’

No: we are not the sort of men that educated, intelligent, well-brought-up young women cross a thousand miles of sea for. They like us well enough ashore, and are kind, and say Good old Tarpaulin when there is a victory. But they don’t marry us, not unless they do it right away – not unless we board them in our own smoke. Given time to reflect, as often as not they marry parsons, or clever chaps at the bar.’

IN HIS JOURNAL Stephen wrote, ‘At most times the diarist may believe he is addressing his future self: but the real height of diary-writing is the gratuitous entry, as this may prove to be.

‘Oh, I know what o’clock it is,’ said Etherege crossly.

It was clear to a man with far less knowledge of morphology than Stephen possessed that there was nothing under Diana’s gown, and he looked out of the window with a light frown: he wished his mind to be perfectly clear.

‘God,’ he thought, ‘never let me outlive my wits.’

‘I believe, sir, this is your first taste of warfare,’ he said. ‘I am afraid you must find it pretty wearisome, with no cabin and no proper meals.’ ‘Oh, I do not mind that in the least, sir,’ cried the chaplain. ‘But I must confess that in my ignorance I had expected something more shall I say exciting? These slow, remote manoeuvres, this prolonged anxious anticipation, formed no part of my image of a battle. Drums and trumpets, banners, stirring exhortations, martial cries, a plunging into the thick of the fray, the shouting of captains – this, rather than interminable waiting in discomfort, in suspended animation, had been my uninformed idea. You will not misunderstand me if I say, I wonder you can stand the boredom.’ ‘It is use, no doubt. War is nine parts boredom, and we grow used to it in the service. But the last hour makes up for all, believe me. I think you may be assured of some excitement tomorrow, or perhaps even this evening. No trumpets, I am afraid, nor exhortations, but I shall do my best in the shouting line, and I dare say you will find the guns dispel the tedium. You will like that, I am sure: it raises a man’s spirits amazingly.’