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Book: Burr
Quotes of Book: Burr

Gore Vidal _ Burr
As we rounded a small pavilion, we nearly stepped into a pair of figures - who leapt apart. One was William de la Touche Clancey. The other was a well-made boy of perhaps sixteen, carefully got up to resemble a swell; only the red blunt hands betrayed the fact that he was a workie."So!" Clancey gave his accusing goose-like hiss.The boy looked embarrassed, as well he should. There are some things that the poor ought not to do even for money.
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Gore Vidal _ Burr
Dr. Bogart was about to tell me more when William de la Touche Clancey sat down next to me with an insolent crash {do I resemble a country youth because I am small?}
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Gore Vidal _ Burr
The Bowery b'hoys were delighted ... to observe a pair of their favorites in league against their natural enemy, for Clancey detests our democracy, finds even the Whigs radical, the Adams family vulgar, Daniel Webster a . He fills the pages of his magazine with libellous comments on all things American. Despite a rich wife and five children, he is a compulsive sodomite, forever preying on country boys new to the city.
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Gore Vidal _ Burr
Safe at the opposite corner, Clancey was himself again - coolly disdainful despite dirt-smeared face, torn shirt ... Clancey's voice is like that of a furious goose, all honks and hisses.
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Gore Vidal _ Burr
As we left the bar, we saw two men fighting at the wooden pump. One was short and stocky: he was pummelling a tall gangling creature with loose flapping arms ... Edwin Forrest was giving a much deserved beating to William de la Touche Clancey, the Tory sodomite.
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Gore Vidal _ Burr
breathed breakfast Madeira in my face. "Charlot, he has robbed me!" I looked at her blankly; not breathing until she removed her face from mine, and sank back onto the velvet cushions. "I have married a thief!" Madame clutched her reticule to her bosom as though I had designs on one or the other, and in a torrent of Frenchified English told me how she had owned stock in a toll-bridge near Hartford. During the first raptures of their honeymoon in the house of Governor Edwards, the Colonel persuaded her to sell the stock. So trusting, so loving, so secure in her new place as the bride of a former vice-president, Madame
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Gore Vidal _ Burr
I confess to not having listened to a word of the Declaration of Independence. At the time I barely knew the name of the author of this sublime document. I do remember hearing someone comment that since Mr. Jefferson had seen fit to pledge so eloquently our lives to the cause of independence, he might at least join us in the army. But wise Tom preferred the safety of Virginia and the excitement of local politics to the discomforts and dangers of war.
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Gore Vidal _ Burr
In other words, if public opinion is not unduly aroused one may safely set aside the Constitution and illegally arrest one's enemies. Had this letter been published at the time, an excellent case might have been made for the impeachment and removal of a president who had broken that oath he had taken to defend and to protect the Constitution by conspiring to obstruct and pervert the course of justice.
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Gore Vidal _ Burr
We are in danger of government by professional office-holders …
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Gore Vidal _ Burr
The next week both small pox and the bloody flux began to go through the camp. General Washington maintained that the flux came from drinking new cider. But the cider-drinking continued, and so for that matter did the flux, which is a terrible death, the bowels emptying out one's life in bloody spasms. I
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Gore Vidal _ Burr
In Broadway, I suddenly found myself face to face with William de la Touche Clancey."Well!" A long drawn-out syllable, in which fear and condescension were unpleasantly mingled. "What is the young Old Patroon about to turn his hand to next?""The Vauxhall Gardens, I should think." My dislike of Clancey is almost physical. Yet I stare at him with fascination; note that his protuberant eyes are yellowish; that he scratches himself compulsively; that his tongue darts in and out of his mouth like a lizard's catching flies."Of the delicious nymphs you sport with there?""Of the delicious fauns, too - and their goatish friends.""Uh-huh..." A long, drawn-out attempt at sounding amused failed of its object. "I hope you realize that your editor's unholy passion for the Negro grows more embarrassing each day. If I were he I should beware. He might simply one dark night.""Murdered? Or sold into slavery?" Clancey recently delighted his admirers by proposing that since the institution of slavery has been an integral part of every high civilization {and peculiarly well-adapted to those nations that follow the word as well as the spirit of Old and New Testaments}, poor whites should be bought and sold as well as blacks."I don't believe that poor sick Mr. Leggett would command a high price in the bazaar. Only his diseased mind would have a certain morbid interest to the special collector. You, on the other hand, ought to fetch a pretty price.""More than the usual two dollars you pay?" Two dollars is the current rate for a male prostitute."Much more! Why, just for those pink Dutch cheeks alone!" It would be nice to record that I thought to something terminal to say but in my rage I could think of absolutely nothing and so left him with the last word.
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Gore Vidal _ Burr
In passing, I continually marvel at how different today's lawyers and politicians are from us of the first generation. We did not possess a single orator to compare with the present crop. Jefferson and Madison were inaudible. Monroe was dull. Hamilton rambled and I was far too dry {and brief} for the popular taste. Fisher Ames was the nearest thing we had to an orator {I never heard Patrick Henry}. Today, however, practically every public man is now a marvellous orator-no, actor! capable of shouting down a tempest, causing tears to flow, laughter to rise. I cannot fathom the reason for this change unless it be the influence of a generation of evangelical ministers {Clay always makes me think of a preacher a-wash in the Blood of the Lamb who, even as he calls his flock to repent, is planning to seduce the lady in the back pew}; and of course today's politician must deal with a much larger electorate than ours. We had only to enchant a caucus in a conversational tone while they must thrill the multitude with brass and cymbal.
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