Unfinished Portrait Quotes

“Nobody ever realized that Celia was shy. They thought she was haughty and conceited. Nobody realized how humble this pretty girl was feeling—how bitterly conscious of her social defects.”
― Mary Westmacott, Unfinished Portrait

“It wasn’t quite so easy when it came to writing down. Her mind had always gone on about six paragraphs farther than the one she was writing down—and then by the time she got to that, the exact wording had gone out of her head.”
― Mary Westmacott, Unfinished Portrait

“Now look here, my dear child, I’m going to talk to you quite plainly. You’re not a heaven-sent genius. I don’t think you’ll ever write a masterpiece. But what you certainly are is a born storyteller. You think of spiritualism and mediums and Welsh Revivalist meetings in a kind of romantic haze. You may be all wrong about them, but you see them as ninety-nine per cent of the reading public (who know nothing about them either) see them. That ninety-nine per cent won’t enjoy reading about carefully acquired facts—they want fiction—which is plausible untruth. It must be plausible, mind. You’ll find it will be the same with your Cornish fisher folk that you told me about. Write your book about them, but, for heaven’s sake, don’t go near Cornwall or fishermen until you’ve finished. Then you’ll write the kind of grimly realistic stuff that people expect when they read about Cornish fisher folk. You don’t want to go there and find out that Cornish fishermen are not a breed by themselves but something quite closely allied to a Walworth plumber. You’ll never write well about anything you really know about, because you’ve got an honest mind. You can be imaginatively dishonest but not practically dishonest. You can’t write lies about something you know, but you’ll be able to tell the most splendid lies about something you don’t know. You’ve got to write about the fabulous (fabulous to you) and not about the real. Now, go away and do it.”
― Mary Westmacott, Unfinished Portrait

“You can't give in to a thing because you're terrified. It isn't decent.”
― Mary Westmacott, Unfinished Portrait

“Mrs Grant was, Celia thought, the loveliest thing she had ever seen. She had silver-grey hair, exquisitely arranged, and wonderful dark-blue eyes, clear-cut features, and a very clear incisive voice.”
― Mary Westmacott, Unfinished Portrait

“Miss Leadbetter was a young lady of extreme refinement. Her English was mincing and clipped. She spoke slowly, with condescending kindness.”
― Mary Westmacott, Unfinished Portrait

“The holy spirit of God’ she said. ‘Think of it, Celia. That is the great wonder and mystery and beauty of God. The prayer books shy at it, and clergymen hardly ever speak about it. They’re afraid to, because they are not sure what it is. The Holy Ghost.’

Miriam worshipped the Holy Ghost. It made Celia feel rather uncomfortable. Miriam didn’t like churches much. Some of them, she said, had more of the Holy Spirit than others. It depended on the people who went there to worship, she said.”
― Mary Westmacott, Unfinished Portrait