Brideshead Revisited

by Evelyn Waugh

“Tell me candidly, have you ever heard Sebastian say anything you have remembered for five minutes? You know, when I hear him talk, I am reminded of that in some ways nauseating picture of ‘Bubbles.’ Conversation should be like juggling; up go the balls and the plates, up and over, in and out, good solid objects that glitter in the foot-lights and fall with a bang if you miss them. But when dear Sebastian speaks it is like a little sphere of soapsud drifting off the end of an old clay pipe, anywhere, full of rainbow light for a second and then—phut! vanished, with nothing left at all, nothing.”