A happy childhood has spoiled many a promising life.
Robertson Davies

A Librettist is a mere drudge in the world of opera.
Robertson Davies

A truly great book should be read in youth, again in maturity and once more in old age, as a fine building should be seen by morning light, at noon and by moonlight.
Robertson Davies

Authors like cats because they are such quiet, lovable, wise creatures, and cats like authors for the same reasons.
Robertson Davies

Canada is not really a place where you are encouraged to have large spiritual adventures.
Robertson Davies

Do not suppose, however, that I intend to urge a diet of classics on anybody. I have seen such diets at work. I have known people who have actually read all, or almost all, the guaranteed Hundred Best Books. God save us from reading nothing but the best.
Robertson Davies

Every man is wise when attacked by a mad dog; fewer when pursued by a mad woman; only the wisest survive when attacked by a mad notion.
Robertson Davies

Extraordinary people survive under the most terrible circumstances and they become more extraordinary because of it.
Robertson Davies

Fanaticism is overcompensation for doubt.
Robertson Davies

Few people can see genius in someone who has offended them.
Robertson Davies


I do not 'get' ideas; ideas get me.
Robertson Davies

I never heard of anyone who was really literate or who ever really loved books who wanted to suppress any of them.
Robertson Davies

I see Canada as a country torn between a very northern, rather extraordinary, mystical spirit which it fears and its desire to present itself to the world as a Scotch banker.
Robertson Davies

If we seek the pleasures of love, passion should be occasional, and common sense continual.
Robertson Davies

Literary critics, however, frequently suffer from a curious belief that every author longs to extend the boundaries of literary art, wants to explore new dimensions of the human spirit, and if he doesn't, he should be ashamed of himself.
Robertson Davies

May I make a suggestion, hoping it is not an impertinence? Write it down: write down what you feel. It is sometimes a wonderful help in misery.
Robertson Davies

No people in the world can make you feel so small as the English.
Robertson Davies

Nothing is so easy to fake as the inner vision.
Robertson Davies

Only a fool expects to be happy all the time.
Robertson Davies

Pornography is rather like trying to find out about a Beethoven symphony by having somebody tell you about it and perhaps hum a few bars.
Robertson Davies