Brendan Behan Quotes
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New York is my Lourdes, where I go for spiritual refreshment... a place where you're least likely to be bitten by a wild goat.
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As regards drink, I can only say that in Dublin during the Depression when I was growing up, drunkenness was not regarded as a social disgrace. To get enough to eat was regarded as an achievement. To get drunk was a victory.
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If it was raining soup, the Irish would go out with forks.
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What an author likes to write most is his signature on the back of a cheque.
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At the innermost core of all loneliness is a deep and powerful yearning for union with one's lost self.
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It's not that the Irish are cynical. It's rather that they have a wonderful lack of respect for everything and everybody.
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All publicity is good, except an obituary notice.
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The sun was in mind to come out but having a look at the weather it was in lost heart and went back again.
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I am a drinker with writing problems.
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An author's first duty is to let down his country.
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If you greatly desire something, have the guts to stake everything on obtaining it.
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I was court-martialled in my absence, and sentenced to death in my absence, so I said they could shoot me in my absence.
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The Bible was a consolation to a fellow alone in the old cell. The lovely thin paper with a bit of matress stuffing in it, if you could get a match, was as good a smoke as I ever tasted.
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There is no such thing as bad publicity except your own obituary.
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A quotation in a speech, article or book is like a rifle in the hands of an infantryman. It speaks with authority.
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I have a total irreverence for anything connected with society except that which makes the roads safer, the beer stronger, the food cheaper and the old men and old women warmer in the winter and happier in the summer.
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If you accept your limitations you go beyond them.
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Mother, they would praise my balls if I hung them high enough.
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No yesterdays are ever wasted for those who give themselves to today.
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I am a daylight atheist.
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Critics are like eunuchs in a harem; they know how it's done, they've seen it done every day, but they're unable to do it themselves.
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When I came back to Dublin I was courtmartialed in my absence and sentenced to death in my absence, so I said they could shoot me in my absence.
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I have never seen a situation so dismal that a policeman couldn't make it worse.
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A man is already halfway in love with any woman who listens to him.