"Tom Browns Schooldays was an important source for character types, plot incidents and motifs for school stories for at least a century following its publication and, arguably, left an indelible mark on the generic form itself."
Tom Brown's School Days is a novel by Thomas Hughes, published in 1857. The story is set in the 1830s at Rugby School, an English public school. Hughes attended Rugby School from 1834 to 1842.
"There isnt such a reasonable fellow in the world, to hear him talk. He never wants anything but whats right and fair; only when you come to settle whats right and fair, its everything that he wants, and nothing that you want. And thats his idea of a compromise. Give me the Brown compromise when Im on his side"
Tom Brown's School Days"But the world goes on its way, and the wheel turns, and the wrongs of the Browns, like other wrongs, seem in a fair way to get righted."
Tom Brown's School Days"They cant let anything alone which they think going wrong. They must speak their mind about it, annoying all easy-going folk; and spend their time and money in having a tinker at it, however hopeless the job. It is an impossibility to a Brown to leave the most disreputable lame dog on the other side of a stile."
Tom Brown's School Days"Failures slide off them like July rain off a ducks back feathers."
Tom Brown's School Days"I pity people who werent born in a vale. I dont mean a flat country, but a vale—that is, a flat country bounded by hills. The having your hill always in view, if you choose to turn toward him, thats the essence of a vale. There he is forever in the distance, your friend and companion; you never lose him as you do in hilly districts."
Tom Brown's School Days"This is worth living for; the whole sum of school-boy existence gathered up into one straining, struggling half-hour, a half-hour worth a year of common life."
Tom Brown's School Days