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Quote by William Makepeace Thackeray

“If he had but a little more brains, she thought to herself, I might make something of him; but she never let him perceive the opinion she had of him; listened with indefatigable complacency to his stories of the stable and the mess; laughed at all his jokes...When he came home, she was alert and happy; when he went out she pressed him to go; when he stayed at home, she played and sang for him, made him good drinks, superintended his dinner, warmed his slippers, and steeped his soul in comfort. The best of women {I have heard my grandmother say) are hypocrites. We don't know how much they hide from us: how watchful they are when they seem most artless and confidential: how often those frank smile which they wear so easily are traps to cajole or elude or disarm--I don't mean in your mere coquettes, but your domestic models and paragons of female virute.”

Quote by William Makepeace Thackeray

Work

Vanity Fair

Vanity Fair is a satirical novel by William Makepeace Thackeray, published in serial form between 1847 and 1848. The story is set against the backdrop of the Napoleonic Wars and explores themes of ambition, social status, and the pursuit of wealth and power. The novel features a complex web of characters and is known for its wit and social commentary. more

Author

William Makepeace Thackeray
William Makepeace Thackeray

William Makepeace Thackeray was a prominent British novelist of the Victorian era, born on July 18, 1811, in India, and died on December 24, 1863. He is known for his satirical and humorous writing style and is considered one of the greatest novelists of the 19th century. His most famous work, 'Vanity Fair', is regarded as a classic of English literature. more

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“My father, you must know, who was originally a Turkey merchant, but had left off business for some years, in order to retire to, and die upon, his paternal estate in the county of ——, was, I believe, one of the most regular men in every thing he did, whether 'twas matter of business, or matter of amusement, that ever lived. As a small specimen of this extreme exactness of his, to which he was in truth a slave, he had made it a rule for many years of his life,—on the first Sunday-night of every month throughout the whole year,—as certain as ever the Sunday-night came,—to wind up a large house-clock, which we had standing on the back-stairs head, with his own hands:—And being somewhere between fifty and sixty years of age at the time I have been speaking of,—he had likewise gradually brought some other little family concernments to the same period, in order, as he would often say to my uncle Toby, to get them all out of the way at one time, and be no more plagued and pestered with them the rest of the month. It was attended but with one misfortune, which, in a great measure, fell upon myself, and the effects of which I fear I shall carry with me to my grave; namely, that from an unhappy association of ideas, which have no connection in nature, it so fell out at length, that my poor mother could never hear the said clock wound up,—but the thoughts of some other things unavoidably popped into her head.”