Great Throughts Treasury

This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.

Harold Nicolson, fully Sir Harold George Nicolson

English Diplomat, Author, Diarist and Politician

"We are all inclined to judge ourselves by our ideals; others by their acts."

"The public is bored by foreign affairs until a crisis arises; and then it is guided by; feelings rather than by thoughts."

"The great secret of successful marriage is to treat all disasters as incidents and none of the incidents as disasters."

"Considering that his hair is like that of a gollywog and his clothes noticeable the other end of Trafalgar Square, this is an odd assertion."

"For shyness is the protective fluid within which our personalities are able to develop into natural shapes. Without this fluid the character becomes merely standardized or imitative: it is within the tender velvet sheath of shyness that the full flower of idiosyncrasy is nurtured: it is from this sheath alone that it can eventually unfold itself, colored and undamaged. Let the shy understand, therefore, that their disability is not only an inconvenience, but also a privilege. Let them regard their shyness as a gift rather than as an affliction. Let them consider how intolerable are those of their contemporaries who are not also shy."

"Let us educate the younger generation to be shy in and out of season: to edge behind the furniture: to say spasmodic and ill-digested things: to twist their feet round the protective feet of sofas and armchairs: to feel that their hands belong to someone else--that they are objects, which they long to put down on some table away from themselves."

"The gift of broadcasting is, without question, the lowest human capacity to which any man could attain."

"Every schoolmaster after the age of forty-nine, is inclined to flatulence is apt to swallow frequently and to puff"

"His muse walked the streets with the others but she wore galoshes and was terribly afraid of being recognized."

"Few things are more agreeable than the spectacle of a man who loses his temper; we should be grateful to such people for providing us with moments of often unsullied delight."

"She proceeds to dip here little fountain-pen filler into pots of oily venom and to squirt this mixture at all her friends."

"The Irish do not want anyone to wish them well; they want everyone to wish their enemies ill."

"These, then, are the qualities of my ideal diplomatist. Truth, accuracy, calm, patience, good temper, modesty and loyalty. They are also the qualities of an ideal diplomacy. But, the reader may object, you have forgotten intelligence, knowledge, discernment, prudence, hospitality, charm, industry, courage and even tact. I have not forgotten them. I have taken them for granted."

"I like life being odd."

"For seventeen years, he did nothing at all but kill animals and stick in stamps. -"

"Intellectuals incline to be individualists, or even independents, are not team conscious and tend to regard obedience as a surrender of personality."

"It has been decided to evacuate three million mothers and children tomorrow from the menaced areas. It is rather grim... It is odd to feel that the world as I knew it has only a few hours more to run."

"One of the minor pleasures of life is to be slightly ill."

"To be a good diarist, one must have a little snouty, sneaky mind."

"Only one person in a thousand is a bore and he is interesting because he is one person in a thousand."