Famous Quotes | No sovereign, no court, no...

No sovereign, no court, no personal loyalty, no aristocracy, no church, no clergy, no army, no diplomatic service, no country gentlemen, no palaces, no castles, nor manors, nor old country- houses, nor parsonages, nor thatched cottages nor ivied ruins; no cathedrals, nor abbeys, nor little Norman churches; no great Universities nor public schools—no Oxford, nor Eton, nor Harrow; no literature, no novels, no museums, no pictures, no political society, no sporting class—no Epsom nor Ascot! Some such list as that might be drawn up of the absent things in American life. - Henry James
Attribution: Henry James (1843–1916), U.S. author. Hawthorne, ch. 2 (1879). “The American knows that a good deal remains,” added James, “what it is that remains—that is his secret, his joke, as one may say.” Nearly thirty-five years later, in a letter (April 1, 1913) to his sister-in-law, James wrote, “Dearest Alice, I could come back to America (could be carried on a stretcher) to die—but never, never to live.”

Categories: Author, United States

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