Nevil Shute Quote

Until we’re dead, we Service people, the world will always be in danger of another war. We had too good a time in the last one. We’ll none of us come out into the open and admit it. It might be better for us if we did. [...] For our generation, the war years were the best time of our lives, not because they were war years but because we were young. The best years of our lives happened to be war years. Everyone looks back at the time when they were in their early twenties with nostalgia, but when we look back we only see the war. We had a fine time then, and so we think that if a third war came we’d have those happy, carefree years all over again. I don’t suppose we would—some of us might.

Nevil Shute

Until we’re dead, we Service people, the world will always be in danger of another war. We had too good a time in the last one. We’ll none of us come out into the open and admit it. It might be better for us if we did. [...] For our generation, the war years were the best time of our lives, not because they were war years but because we were young. The best years of our lives happened to be war years. Everyone looks back at the time when they were in their early twenties with nostalgia, but when we look back we only see the war. We had a fine time then, and so we think that if a third war came we’d have those happy, carefree years all over again. I don’t suppose we would—some of us might.

Tags: youth

Related Quotes

About Nevil Shute

Nevil Shute Norway (17 January 1899 – 12 January 1960) was an English novelist and aeronautical engineer who spent his later years in Australia. He used his full name in his engineering career and Nevil Shute as his pen name, in order to protect his engineering career from inferences by his employers (Vickers) or from fellow engineers that he was "not a serious person" or from potentially adverse publicity in connection with his novels, which included On the Beach and A Town Like Alice.