In a town like London there are always plenty of not quite certifiable lunatics walking the streets, and they tend to gravitate towards bookshops, because a bookshop is one of the few places where you can hang about for a long time without spending any money.

George Orwell (1903-1950)

Would you know why I like London so Much? Why if the world must consist of so many fools as it does, I choose to take them in the gross, and not made into separate pills, as they are prepared in the country.

Horace Walpole (1717-1797)

In a word, man in London is not quite so good a creature as he is out of it.

John Galt (1779-1839)

The Londoner seldom understands his city until it sweeps him, too, away from his moorings.

E. M. Forster (1879-1970), Howards End

The amount of women in London who flirt with their own husbands is perfectly scandalous. It looks so bad. It is simply washing one’s clean linen in public.

Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) The importance of being Ernest