I was asked to-night why I refuse to have truck with intellectuals after business hours. But of course I won’t. 1. I am not an intellectual. Two minutes’ talk with Aldous Huxley, William Glock, or any of the New Statesman crowd would expose me utterly. 2. I am too tired after my day’s work to man the intellectual palisade. 3. When my work is finished I want to eat, drink, smoke, and relax. 4. I don’t know very much, but what I do know I know better than anybody, and I don’t want to argue about it. I know what I think about an actor or an actress, and am not interested in what anybody else thinks. My mind is not a bed to be made and re-made.
ATTRIBUTION:
James Agate (1877–1947), British drama critic. “Ego 6,” entry for June 9, 1943, The Selective Ego, ed. Tim Beaumont (1976).
