76 Quotes by Ivy Compton-Burnett

As regards plots I find real life no help at all. Real life seems to have no plots. And as I think a plot desirable and almost necessary, I have this extra grudge against real life. But I think there are signs that strange things happen, though they do not emerge

Things only ferment and fester in the dark.

Speaking of things robs them of half their terrors.

There is more difference within the sexes than between them.

A leopard does not change his spots, or change his feeling that spots are rather a credit.

My youth is escaping without giving me anything it owes me.

Well, of course, people are only human... But it really does not seem much for them to be.

Time is not a great healer. It is an indifferent and perfunctory one. Sometimes it does not heal at all. And sometimes when it seems to, no healing has been necessary.

People who have power respond simply. They have no minds but their own.