Literary Birthday – 5 June – Ivy Compton-Burnett

Ivy Compton-Burnett was born 5 June 1884 and died 27 August 1969.

Seven Quotes

1. As regards plot I find real life no help at all. Real life seems to have no plots. And as I think a plot desirable and almost necessary, I have this extra grudge against life.
2. Magnifying a matter is not the way to mend it.
3. A plot is like the bones of a person, not interesting like expression, or signs of experience, but the support of the whole.
4. People do not like to lose their lives. That is the reason why they should not take other people’s.
5. [On writing:] What a difficult kind of work to choose! But of course one did not choose it. There was no choice.
6. Most of the pleasure of making a book would go if it held nothing to be shared by other people. I would write for a few dozen people, and sometimes it seems that I do so, but I would not write for no-one.
7. We must use words as they are used, or stand aside from life.

Ivy Compton-Burnett was an English novelist. She won the 1955 James Tait Black Memorial Prize for her novel Mother and Son. Her work focuses on family life among the late-Victorian or Edwardian upper middle class.

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by Amanda Patterson

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