I write because, exacting as it may be to do so, it is still more difficult to refrain, and because - however conscious of one's limitations one may ….

Behind each biography there should always be a rich treasury of unformulated knowledge, a tapestry that has not been unrolled..

[On writing biography:] If you wish to see a person you must not start by seeing through him..

The biographer's real business - if it is not too arrogant to say so - is simply this: to bring the dead to life..

[On writing biography:] ... every human life is at once so complex and so simple, so perplexing and so clear, so superficial and so profound, that an….

I believe that every life , irrespective of its events and setting, holds something of unique value, which it should be possible to communicate, if ….

while it is certainly the biographer's business to describe the foibles, passions and idiosyncrasies which make his subject a person, his work will b….

whereas in childhood ... it was the parents' judgement that mattered to the child, later on the situation becomes reversed: it is then that the opini….

I do not think that one is likely to write a good biography unless one feels some sympathy with its subject..

We are being governed by the dregs of the nation - and their brutality is so capricious that no one can feel certain that he will be safe tomorrow..

I believe, not theoretically, but from direct personal experience, that very few of the things that happen to us are purposeless or accidental (and t….

Just as, in travel, one may miss seeing the sunset because one cannot find the ticket-office or is afraid of missing the train, so in even the closes….