Up the Down Staircase (1967)

Patrick Bedford: Paul Barringer

Photos 

Quotes 

• Paul Barringer : They say a writer should stick to what he knows. What nonsense. What did Dickens know about French Revolutions? What did Shakespeare know about Moors in Venice? If he stuck to what he knew, we'd have no Othello, we'd have no Alice in Wonderland, we'd have no Treasure Island. You brats think that I and Miss Barrett stand up there day after day, talking about books, and the writing of books, just for the hell of it? You think it's got nothing to do with YOU? A writer creates a book. And individual creates a life. For a writer to create a masterpiece, he's got to think beyond what he knows. For an individual to create a life, even a half-way decent one, he's gotta go beyond what he knows. Go beyond the poverty, the dope the disease, the degeneracy. Go beyond the oceans to the alps... a magnificent replica of which the board of education has generously donated. Stick with what you think, and that's what you're gonna be stuck with. You may as well get out. Now! All of you... Miss Barrett's class dismissed. All of you dismissed for the rest of your crummy lives. Some of you prefer to leave by the window. I prefer to leave by the door. Punch me out. Will ya, Teach?

• [Suggesting a teaching method] 

  Paul Barringer : Ever tried "punctuation sex", Henrietta? Hyphens are kisses, commas are maybes, and a period is a definite no. And then of course, there's the... limitless realms of semicolons and apostrophes. I shudder to think what an exclamation point might mean.