Oscar Wilde

'It would be unfair to expect other people to be as remarkable as oneself' Wilde's celebrated witticisms on the dangers of sincerity, duplicitous biographers, the stupidity of the English - and his own genius. One of 46 new books in the bestselling Little Black Classics series, to celebrate the first ever Penguin Classic in 1946. Each book gives readers a taste of the Classics' huge range and diversity, with works from around the world and across the centuries - including fables, decadence, heartbreak, tall tales, satire, ghosts, battles and elephants.

Only Dull People Are Brilliant at Breakfast

Sam Skurka

Life is much too important a thing ever to talk seriously about it.

The true dramatist... shows us life under the conditions of art, not art in the form of life.

As for marriage, it is one of their most popular institutions. The American man marries early, and the American woman marries often; and they get on extremely well together.

America has never quite forgiven Europe for having been discovered somewhat earlier in history than itself.

The only form of fiction in which real characters do not seem out of place is history.

But what is the good of friendship if one cannot say exactly what one means? Anybody can say charming things and try to please and to flatter, but a true friend always says unpleasant things, and does not mind giving pain. Indeed, if he is a really true friend he prefers it, for he knows that then he is doing good.

I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying.

Prayer must never be answered: if it is, it ceases to be prayer and becomes correspondence.

I have made an important discovery... that alcohol, taken in sufficient quantities, produces all the effects of intoxication.

Thinking is the most unhealthy thing in the world, and people die of it just as they die of any other disease. Fortunately, in England at any rate, thought is not catching.

Only Dull People Are Brilliant at Breakfast quotes

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