"The main question to a novel is --……" — Sydney Smith
"The main question to a novel is -- did it amuse? were you surprised at dinner coming so soon? did you mistake eleven for ten? were you too late to dress? and did you sit up beyond the usual hour? If a novel produces these effects, it is good; if it does not -- story, language, love, scandal itself cannot save it. It is only meant to please; and it must do that or it does nothing."
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Sydney Smith
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More Amuse Quotes
This quote is filed under Amuse Quotes,
one of 161 quotes in that category. Here are a few more:
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'And for my part, Gentlemen,' said I, 'that I may put in for a share, and guess with the rest;…
— Cyrano de Bergerac
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Beauty can't amuse you, but brainwork - reading, writing, thinking - can.
— Helen Gurley Brown
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I'm undaunted in my quest to amuse myself by constantly changing my hair.
— Hillary Clinton
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That one must do some work seriously and must be independent and not merely amuse oneself in life-this our mother…
— Unknown Author
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One set of messages of the society we live in is: Consume. Grow. Do what you want. Amuse yourselves. The…
— Susan Sontag
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... the first thing his education demands is the provision of an environment in which he can develop the powers…
— Maria Montessori
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Religion has become to many merely a means of doing a little charity work, just to amuse them after a…
— Swami Vivekananda
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True happiness is to enjoy the present, without anxious dependence upon the future, not to amuse ourselves with either hopes…
— Seneca the Elder
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Science can amuse and fascinate us all, but it is engineering that changes the world.
— Isaac Asimov
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I have always done my sketches, as people would say, for the fun of it... I have worked to amuse…
— Aubrey Beardsley
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Don't think you can...know you can! Your human body is the most impressive tool that you will ever own. Even…
— Jeff Hardy
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Man's destructive hand spares nothing that lives; he kills to feed himself, he kills to clothe himself, he kills to…
— Joseph de Maistre
See all 161 Amuse Quotes »