TV
24 hilarious quotes from Violet Crawley
Downton Abbey may only have begun airing in 2010, but Dame Maggie Smith’s portrayal of the witty, snobby and downright sassy Dowager Countess has made her one of the most beloved TV characters of all time. Let's take a look back at some of Violet Crawley’s funniest, wisest and most cutting one-liners in the show’s six-season history.
- “Don't be defeatist, dear. It's very middle class.”
- “I was right about my maid. She’s leaving – to get married! How could she be so selfish?”
- "There's nothing simpler than avoiding people you don't like. Avoiding one's friends, that's the real test."
- “She’s so slight a real necklace would flatten her.”
- “A woman of my age can face reality far better than most men.”
- “What is a weekend?”
- “Every woman goes down the aisle with half the story hidden.”
- “It's the job of grandmothers to interfere.”
- “I am a woman, Mary. I can be as contrary as I choose.”
- “Principles are like prayers; noble, of course, but awkward at a party.”
- Isobel: “How you hate to be wrong.” Violet: “I wouldn’t know, I’m not familiar with the sensation.”
- “I have plenty of friends I don’t like.”
- “If I were to search for logic, I would not look for it among the English upper class.”
- “It always happens when you give these little people power, it goes to their heads like strong drink.”
- “No life appears rewarding if you think about it too much.”
- “Twenty-four years ago you married Cora against my wishes for her money. Give it away now and what was the point of your peculiar marriage in the first place?”
- “I couldn’t have electricity in the house. I couldn’t sleep a wink. All those vapours seeping about.”
- “If she won’t say yes when he might be poor, he won’t want her when he will be rich.”
- "In my day a Lady was incapable of feeling physical attraction, until she had been instructed to do so by her Mama."
- “Of course it would happen to a foreigner. No Englishman would dream of dying in someone else's house."
- “An Aristocrat without servants is about as useful as a glass hammer.”
- “No guest should be admitted without the date of their departure settled.”
- “I do hope I’m interrupting something.”
- “At my age one must ration one’s excitement.”
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