Topical Guide 395
Mark Dorset
Aging; Youth and Age; Old People
“Well,” said Herb, “since I’m the oldest — ”
Margot and Martha and Mark snickered. Herb gave them a quizzical look. “It’s nothing,” Mark said. “It just has to do with our announcement. I’ll explain in a minute.”
“Well,” said Herb again, “since I’m the oldest, I’m going to go first.”
“Oh, Herb,” said Lorna, “can’t you see they’re bursting to tell us? The three of them look like the cat that swallowed the canary. Let them tell us their announcement first, Herb.”
“Oh, no, no,” said Martha. “That’s all right. Herb should go first. Age does have its privileges.” The three of them snickered again. “You’ll find out why we’re laughing,” said Martha.Herb ’n’ Lorna, Chapter 20
How old were Herb and Lorna at this point? I estimate that they were in their late sixties, possibly as old as seventy. How old were Mark and Margot and Martha? About twenty-five, I think. MD
I shall soon be six-and-twenty. Is there anything in the future that can possibly console us for not being always twenty-five?
Lord Byron, Letters and Journals, edited by Leslie A. Marchand, entry for December 1, 1813 (via Robert Andrews, The Columbia Dictionary of Quotations)
You must not pity me because my sixtieth year finds me still astonished. Te be astonished is one of the surest ways of not growing old too quickly.
Colette, in her speech on being elected to the Belgian Academy, as quoted in Earthly Paradise: Colette’s Autobiography Drawn from Her Lifetime Writings, edited by Robert Phelps (via Robert Andrews, The Columbia Dictionary of Quotations)
One is rarely an impulsive innovator after the age of sixty, but one can still be a very fine orderly and inventive thinker. One rarely procreates children at that age, but one isall the more skilled at educating those who have already been procreated, and education is procreation of another kind.
G. C. Lichtenberg, Aphorisms, “Notebook K” (1765–1799) translated by R. J. Hollingdale (via Robert Andrews, The Columbia Dictionary of Quotations)
To be seventy years old is like climbing the Alps. You reach a snow-crowned summit, and see behind you the deep valley stretching miles and miles away, and before you other summits higher and whiter, which you may have strength to climb, or may not. Then you sit down and meditate and wonder which it will be.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, in a letter, March 13, 1877 (via Robert Andrews, The Columbia Dictionary of Quotations)
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