English Quotes
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I first decided that I wanted to act when I was 9. And I was at a very bizarre prep school at the time; to say 'high Anglo-Catholic' would be a real English understatement.
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The theory of the teacher with all these immigrant kids was that if you spoke English loudly enough they would eventually understand.
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The English press, are so nosy, and the English seem to love that eavesdropping.
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The English never smash in a face. They merely refrain from asking it to dinner.
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In a couple of Ahdaf Soueif's novels, she gets at the certain kind of English that's being spoken by Egyptians. It's a beautiful, expressive English but it is non-standard, "broken" English that happens to be efficient, eloquent, and communicates perfectly well even if it is breaking rules.
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I feel more Irish than English. I feel freer than British, more visceral, with a love of language. Shot through with fire in some way. That's why I resist being appropriated as the current repository of Shakespeare on the planet. That would mean I'm part of the English cultural elite, and I am utterly ill-fitted to be.
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I read everything from comics to magazines to fiction - I learned to read in English, years before being able to speak a word of it, by reading 'National Geographic.'
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For all we know that English people are/ Fed upon beef - I won't say much of beer/ Because 'tis liquor only, and being far/ From this my subject, has no business here;/ We know too, they are very fond of war,/ A pleasure - like all pleasures - rather dear;/ So were the Cretans - from which I infer/ That beef and battle both were owing her.
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I just feel that if I'm English and writing about an American president, I have got to have someone on my side who can help me out when I'm lapsing into lazy or obvious European skepticism.
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It's an important social duty to spread the word of English to people whose livelihoods depend on knowing the language.
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It was so boring, and 'Dragonheart' was so unchallenging - there was no research involved or any rehearsal. So I was in my hotel room every night with no English-language TV except 'Beavis and Butt-head' at 10 o'clock every night.
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I think I am less self-assured when I write English than I would be if I were writing in my first language. I have to test each sentence over and over to be sure that it's right, that I haven't introduced some element that isn't English.
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I speak, Hindi, English, and American. I'm trilingual.
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I made 'Enemy' to prep myself for 'Prisoners.' I had the need to direct something smaller in English before going to Hollywood. That's the way I sold it to Warner because they asked me if I was berserk to make a movie right before.
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I think the most dangerous word in the English language is 'should.' 'I should have done this.' Or 'I should do that.' 'Should' implies responsibility. It connotes demand. Which is just not the case. Life ebbs and flows.
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Boys! Are they always this impossible? Do they always say cryptic, indecipherable things? (Note to self: work with Liz to adapt her boy-to-English translator into a more mobile form—like maybe a watch or necklace.)
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Speaking and writing English perfectly should not be a privilege. To those who try to politicize this matter, I tell them now, do not mess with the future of our children.
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I'd love to do something like 'A Canterbury Tale,' because I love the English language.
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I believed that English-speaking people had a divine mission to civilize the world by making it western, democratic and Christian.
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Of course, English is a very powerful language, a colonizer's language and a gift to a writer. English has destroyed and sucked up the languages of other cultures - its cruelty is its vitality.
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Unlike the current occupant of the White House, he has no difficulty in orally extemporising a series of grammatical English sentences, each containing a main verb.
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It was in this reign that Joan of Arc reigned and made such a row among the English.
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It is not true that the English invented cricket as a way of making all other human endeavours look interesting and lively; that was merely an unintended side effect. I don't wish to denigrate a sport that is enjoyed by millions, some of them awake and facing the right way, but it is an odd game.
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My parents are huge influences on me. My mother was an English teacher. My father played professional rugby and coached rugby for the Irish rugby team.
