Osbert Sitwell

It is fatal to be appreciated in one's own time.

— Osbert Sitwell

The terrible newly imported American doctrine that everyone ought to do something.

— Osbert Sitwell

Hell has a climate, but no situation. It lies in the spirit, and not in space.

— Osbert Sitwell

My education [takes place] during the holidays from Eton.

— Osbert Sitwell

Blood is that fragile scarlet tree we carry within us.

— Osbert Sitwell

I have always said that if I were a rich man, I would employ a professional praiser.

— Osbert Sitwell

For forty days he went out into the desert - and never shot anything [on Jesus]

— Osbert Sitwell

The Rich Man's Banquet, which was to last for a decade, had now begun: the feast, it was recognised, went to the…

— Osbert Sitwell

For Poetry is the wisdom of the blood,That scarlet tree within, which has the powerTo make dull words bud forth and burst…

— Osbert Sitwell

In reality, killing time is only the name for another of the multifarious ways by which Time kills us.

— Osbert Sitwell

We attended stables, as we attended church, in our best clothes, thereby no doubt showing the degree of respect due to horses.

— Osbert Sitwell

The artist, like the idiot or clown, sits on the edge of the world, and a push may send him over it.

— Osbert Sitwell

Everywhere men have unlocked the prisoners within, and from under the disguising skins the apes have leapt joyfully out.

— Osbert Sitwell

A golf course outside a big town serves an excellent purpose in that it segregates, as though a concentration camp, all the…

— Osbert Sitwell

Poetry is like fish: if it's fresh, it's good; if it's stale, it's bad; and if you're not certain, try it on…

— Osbert Sitwell

How simple-minded of the Germans to imagine that we British could be cowed by the destruction of our ancient monuments! As though…

— Osbert Sitwell

Heroic figures are now obsolete,So Demigod and Devil find retreatIn minds of children - as rare beasts and men,Elsewhere extinct, persist in…

— Osbert Sitwell

The only difference between an artist and a lunatic is, perhaps, that the artist has the restraint or courtesy to conceal the…

— Osbert Sitwell