Quotes

“The fact is we can only love what we know personally. And we cannot know much. In public affairs, in the rebuilding of civilization, something less dramatic and emotional is needed, namely tolerance.” Edward Morgan Forster

“What is wonderful about great literature is that it transforms the man who reads it towards the condition of the man who wrote.” Edward Morgan Forster

“So, two cheers for Democracy: one because it admits variety and two because it permits criticism.” Edward Morgan Forster

“There is much good luck in the world, but it is luck. We are none of us safe. We are children, playing or quarrelling on the line.” Edward Morgan Forster

“The woman who can't influence her husband to vote the way she wants ought to be ashamed of herself.” Edward Morgan Forster

“A poem is true if it hangs together. Information points to something else. A poem points to nothing but itself.” Edward Morgan Forster

“How can I know what I think till I see what I say?” Edward Morgan Forster

“Charm, in most men and nearly all women, is a decoration.” Edward Morgan Forster

“At night, when the curtains are drawn and the fire flickers, my books attain a collective dignity.” Edward Morgan Forster

“The sadness of the incomplete, the sadness that is often Life, but should never be Art.” Edward Morgan Forster

“I am certainly an ought and not a must.” Edward Morgan Forster

“I hate the idea of causes, and if I had to choose between betraying my country and betraying my friend, I hope I should have the guts to betray my country.” Edward Morgan Forster

“To make us feel small in the right way is a function of art; men can only make us feel small in the wrong way.” Edward Morgan Forster

“Only a struggle twists sentimentality and lust together into love.” Edward Morgan Forster

“The king died and then the queen died is a story. The king died, and then queen died of grief is a plot.” Edward Morgan Forster

“But nothing in India is identifiable, the mere asking of a question causes it to disappear or to merge in something else.” Edward Morgan Forster

“The people I respect most behave as if they were immortal and as if society was eternal.” Edward Morgan Forster

“If I had to choose between betraying my country and betraying my friend, I hope I should have the guts to betray my country.” Edward Morgan Forster

“At the side of the everlasting why, is a yes, and a yes, and a yes.” Edward Morgan Forster

“We are willing enough to praise freedom when she is safely tucked away in the past and cannot be a nuisance. In the present, amidst dangers whose outcome we cannot foresee, we get nervous about her, and admit censorship.” Edward Morgan Forster

“Either life entails courage, or it ceases to be life.” Edward Morgan Forster

“Two cheers for Democracy; one because it admits variety, and two because it permits criticism.” Edward Morgan Forster

“Liking one person is an extra reason for liking another.” Edward Morgan Forster

“Faith, to my mind, is a stiffening process, a sort of mental starch.” Edward Morgan Forster

“I'm a holy man minus the holiness.” Edward Morgan Forster

“Only a writer who has the sense of evil can make goodness readable.” Edward Morgan Forster

“Love and understand the Italians, for the people are more marvellous than the land.” Edward Morgan Forster

“Creative writers are always greater than the causes that they represent.” Edward Morgan Forster

“Railway termini are our gates to the glorious and the unknown. Through them we pass out into adventure and sunshine, to them, alas! we return.” Edward Morgan Forster

“Only people who have been allowed to practise freedom can have the grown-up look in their eyes.” Edward Morgan Forster