Tom Stoppard History Quotations

I think... the history of civilization is an attempt to codify, classify and categorize aspects of human nature that hardly lend themselves to that process.

If Beethoven had been killed in a plane crash at the age of 22, it would have changed the history of music and of aviation.

The idea that anybody might be allowed to use their common sense when clearly no harm is being done is part of history now.

"The [London] Times" has published no rumours; it's only reported facts, namely that other, less responsible papers are publishing certain rumours.

You're familiar with the tragedies of antiquity, are you? The great homicidal classics?

We do on stage things that are supposed to happen off. Which is a kind of integrity, if you look on every exit as being an entrance somewhere else.

I want to be part of the Royal Court's history before I pack it in. Some of my best nights of the last 40 years have been spent in the Royal Court's auditorium. I don't want to fall under a bus before having a play on its stage.