If I knew what the meanings of my books were, I wouldn't have bothered to write them. — Margaret Drabble Book Copy Share Image
Novels, since the birth of the genre, have been full of rejected, seduced, and abandoned maidens, whose proper fate is to die... — Margaret Drabble Abandoned Copy Share Image
“Before Octavia was born, I used to think that love bore some relation to merit and to beauty, but now I saw… — Margaret Drabble Beauty Copy Share Image
You have to be careful what you imagine, because the act of imagining is the act of encouraging yourself to be a… — Margaret Drabble Be careful Copy Share Image
There would be more genuine rejoicing at the discovery of a complete new novel by Jane Austen than any other literary discovery,… — Margaret Drabble Austen Copy Share Image
“His chief failing was a habit of cracking heavy pedantic jokes; he was unable to let a good idea drop, and remarked… — Margaret Drabble Failure Copy Share Image
“Do you think preservatives make you live longer, or do they kill you off, asks Fran. She has often wondered about this.” — Margaret Drabble Copy Share Image
“One wouldn’t want to be responsible for the end, but one might like to be there and know it was all over,… — Margaret Drabble Copy Share Image
“Too much of the world was inhospitable, intractable... Why prove that it had ever once been green?” — Margaret Drabble Copy Share Image
What really annoys me are the ones who write to say, I am doing your book for my final examinations and could… — Margaret Drabble Annoying Copy Share Image
I need words and print... I need print like an addict. I could live without it, perhaps. But I hope I never… — Margaret Drabble Addict Copy Share Image
“She has often suspected that her last words to herself and in this world will prove to be 'You bloody old fool'… — Margaret Drabble Last words Copy Share Image
On one thing professionals and amateurs agree: mothers can't win. — Margaret Drabble Agree Copy Share Image
“Bread and dripping, Dorothy had mentioned. You couldn’t offer that to man or boy now, not because they wouldn’t eat it, although… — Margaret Drabble Copy Share Image
I'd rather be at the end of a dying tradition, which I admire, than at the beginning of a tradition which I… — Margaret Drabble Admire Copy Share Image
The rare pleasure of being seen for what one is, compensates for the misery of being it. — Margaret Drabble Being Copy Share Image
Our desire to conform is greater than our respect for objective facts. — Margaret Drabble Conform Copy Share Image
Lord knows what incommunicable small terrors infants go through, unknown to all. — Margaret Drabble Infant Copy Share Image
The women are always vixens or monsters. They can't just be normal people in the book. — Margaret Drabble Book Copy Share Image
“Robots would save the elderly from the woes of the ageing flesh.” — Margaret Drabble Robotics Copy Share Image
There are some writers who wrote too much. There are others who wrote enough. There are yet others who wrote nothing like… — Margaret Drabble Admirer Copy Share Image
