The Slaves of Solitude Quotes

“London, the crouching monster, like every other monster has to breathe, and breathe it does in its own obscure, malignant way. Its vital oxygen is composed of suburban working men and women of all kinds, who every morning are sucked up through an infinitely complicated respiratory apparatus of trains and termini into the mighty congested lungs, held there for a number of hours, and then, in the evening, exhaled violently through the same channels.”
― Patrick Hamilton, The Slaves of Solitude

“Mr. Thwaites was, of course, a pronounced and leading Christmasist, being the instinctive leader of everything irritating and depressing, and the others followed him.”
― Patrick Hamilton, The Slaves of Solitude

“The meal was breakfast: the subject, utility clothing. 'As for the stuff they're turning out for men nowadays,' said Mr Thwaites bitterly, 'I wouldn't give it to my Valet.'

Mr Thwaites' valet was quite an old friend. An unearthly, flitting presence, whose shape, character, age, and appearance could only be dimly conceived, he had been turning up every now and again ever since Miss Roach had known Mr Thwaites. Mostly he was summoned into being as one from whom all second-rate, shoddy, or inferior articles were withheld. But sometimes things were good enough for Mr Thwaites' valet, but would not do for Mr Thwaites. ”
― Patrick Hamilton, The Slaves of Solitude

“And didst thou imbibe mighty potions from the fruit of the grape (...)? And hast thou one Ache, this morning (...) appertaining unto Head, and much repentance in thy Soul forsooth?”
― Patrick Hamilton, The Slaves of Solitude

“He had further narrowed his mind by a considerable amount of travel abroad, where he had again always made his way to the small hotels.”
― Patrick Hamilton, The Slaves of Solitude

“It was not so much what Vicki did that night: it was what she said. It was not so much her behaviour: it was her vocabulary!”
― Patrick Hamilton, The Slaves of Solitude

“What a thing this sleeplessness was! . . . If sleep, she thought, could be compared to a gentle lake in a dark place, then sleeplessness was a roaring ocean, a raging, wind-buffeted voyage, lit with mad rocket-lights, pursued by wild phantoms from behind, plunging upon fearful rocks ahead, a mad tempest of the past and present and future all in one. Through all this the pale, strenuous mariner must somehow steer a way, until at last the weary dawn, not of sleep, but of resignation to sleeplessness, comes to calm the waters of the mind.”
― Patrick Hamilton, The Slaves of Solitude

“Thus looked at from outside, these guests
--in this dead-and-alive dining room, of this dead-and-alive house, of this dead-and-alive street, of this dead-and-alive little town--in grey, dead winter of the deadliest part of the most deadly war in history--thus seen from a detached point of view, they presented an extraordinary spectacle.”
― Patrick Hamilton, The Slaves of Solitude

“Dawn, slowly filling Church Street with grey light, disclosed another day of war. Because it did this, this dawn bore no more resemblance to a peace-time dawn than the aspect of nature on a Sunday bears a resemblance to the aspect of nature on a weekday. Thus it seemed that dawn itself had been grimly harnessed to the war effort.”
― Patrick Hamilton, The Slaves of Solitude

“...elderly guests were already setting about their business--the business, that is to say, of those who in fact had no business on this earth save that of cautiously steering their respective failing bodies along paths free from discomfort and illness in the direction of the final illness which would exterminate them.”
― Patrick Hamilton, The Slaves of Solitude

“She was, she saw, always having thoughts for which she rebuked herself. It then flashed across her mind that the thoughts for which she rebuked herself seldom turned out to be other than shrewd and fruitful thoughts: and she rebuked herself for this as well.”
― Patrick Hamilton, The Slaves of Solitude

“That Christmas of hatred, fear, pain, terror, and disgrace. It all began at that moment.”
― Patrick Hamilton, The Slaves of Solitude

“Miss Steele was a thin, quiet woman of about sixty, who used rouge and powder somewhat heavily, whose white, frizzy, well-kept hair had the appearance of being, without being, a wig, and whose whole manner gave the impression of her having, without her having had, a past. She was careful to avow at all times her predilection for ‘fun’, for ‘cocktails’, for ‘broadmindedness’, for those who in common with her were ‘cursed’ with a sense of humour, and for the company of young people as opposed to ‘old fogies’ like herself. But she had, in fact, little fun, no cocktails, and no company younger than that furnished by the Rosamund Tea Rooms. She was also advanced in the matter of culture, for she had no time for ‘modern novels’. Instead she read endless Boots’ biographies of historical characters, and was, in fact, a historian.”
― Patrick Hamilton, The Slaves of Solitude

“The madness of Christmas is not to be resisted by any human means. It either stealthily creeps or crudely batters its way into every fastness or fortress of prudence all over the land.”
― Patrick Hamilton, The Slaves of Solitude

“A goodly soup, i'troth," he said, and he Trothed at the chicken, and Trothed at the waiter, and Trothed at both the waitresses (even the one who was not serving at the table at which they were sitting), and Trothed at the cheese, and Trothed at the furnishing of the dining-room (which met with his approval), and Trothed and Trothed and Trothed.”
― Patrick Hamilton, The Slaves of Solitude

“It was not for the piano-tuner to know that in this still, grey, winter-gripped dining-room, this apparent mortuary of desire and passion (in which the lift rumbled and knives and forks scraped upon plates), waves were flowing forward and backward, and through and through, of hellish revulsion and unquenchable hatred!”
― Patrick Hamilton, The Slaves of Solitude

“The feeling of the morning after the night before is not a sensation endured by the dissolute only: every morning, for every human being, is in some sort a morning after the night before...”
― Patrick Hamilton, The Slaves of Solitude

“There was not even any hope for Miss Roach that Mr. Thwaites would ever die.”
― Patrick Hamilton, The Slaves of Solitude