Susan Howatch Quotes

Man cannot live on charm alone, and an ambitious man cannot live on anything less than wealth, good social connections and substantial political influence.

The one advantage of being childless is that one can choose one's children and so avoid the bizarre game of chance in which one passes one's best — or one's worst — genes to one's poor innocent offspring.

Ghosts, unshriven souls, psychological hang-ups — they all exist in the mind to put people through hell — they're just different ways [...] of looking at a given situation.

Life's for living, not for mourning ... Live in the present, not the past.

Redemption's just a word and as I'm not a Christian it means nothing to me.

Success on that scale don't make for happiness. Look at Asquith. Why does he drink? I wouldn't want you to end up a drunkard like that.

A rational disposition must necessarily preclude a romantic outlook in life, and only the failures of this world can afford to dispense with a rational disposition.

The English don't have opinions about the Irish. They have prejudices.

Christ, all you psychiatrists think about is sex — sex, sex, sex, sex, sex ...

Bloody men! sometimes I feel I hate them all.

To be distracted is pardonable. To be incoherent is simply unobliging.

Sexual desire has to be dead as a doornail before a man and a woman can be genuinely at peace in a platonic relationship.

Death had won my three friends; Death had almost won me. But now I was the one who was going to win and I was going to win by outwitting Death over and over again ... To compete with Death, as I had discovered in the mountains, was to know one was alive.

Again, be patient. And have courage. Remember, everything passes, even the most unspeakable horrors.

I could always walk out on a husband. But I could never turn my back on a friend.