Sarah Lancashire Quotes

I was 21 and had been going out with my boyfriend for two years when I found out I was pregnant - despite being told by doctors that I was sterile. Jamie's father and I hadn't discussed marriage, and to me, it wasn't something to be entered into just to stop gossip.

There are many who dare not kill themselves for fear of what the neighbours will say.

I have a daughter from a relationship I had in my late teens or early 20s. Because I felt it wasn't the kind of pukka behaviour my family or relatives would admit to, I denied it for many years.

If I don't call my mom back, she'll go on Twitter and say, 'Adam hasn't called me. I'm worried about him,' and strangers will say, 'You're horrible. You go call your mom right now!' It's very complicated.

Not so much anymore but some years ago in my homeland there was a habit, something called 'casamiento de apuro,' a marriage in haste because the baby is coming and to cover socially the honor of the family. There, they weren't free and it happened many times this marriage is null. As a bishop I forbade my priests to do this.

My parents told me I must get married. I was seen as a failure if I didn't do it.

We are often deterred from crime by the disgrace of others.

Shame may restrain what law does not prohibit.

I promise not to become a source of shame for you.

It is ironic that it doesn't matter how successful I am in any other capacity: ultimately, my parents' marker is 'Do you have a wife?' and 'Do you have children?'

I think it's very wrong to be an unwed mother. You give your child the stigma of illegitimacy.

Being a single mother in the late 1950s was a very shocking thing - and dreadful thing - for people.

It is not the conscience which raises a blush, for a man may sincerely regret some slight fault committed in solitude, or he may suffer the deepest remorse for an undetected crime, but he will not blush... It is not the sense of guilt, but the thought that others think or know us to be guilty which crimsons the face.

All men thirst to confess their crimes more than tired beasts thirst for water; but they naturally object to confessing them while other people, who have also committed the same crimes, sit by and laugh at them.

My father told me, "Don't do anything that would bring shame to the family." I was always mindful of that. When I told him I wanted to pursue a career as an actor, my father said, "Look at what you see on television at the movies, is that what you want to be doing? Do you want to make a life out of that?" And I said, "Daddy, I'm going to change it".

The last thing I ever want to do is disappoint my parents. If something ever happened to one of my parents, I'd want them to go knowing I made them proud.

Your success and happiness are forgiven you only if you generously consent to share them. But to be happy it is essential not to be too concerned with others. Consequently, there is no escape. Happy and judged, or absolved and wretched.

I think a single woman's biggest problem is coping with the people who are trying to marry her off!

We cannot avert our eyes without staining our souls.

O shame, where is thy blush?

Personal humiliation was painful. Humiliation of one's family was much worse. Humiliation of one's social status was agony to bear. But humiliation of one's nation was the most excruciating of human miseries.

Reading, to most people, means an ashamed way of killing time disguised under a dignified name

Misery and shame are nearly allied.

If no one saw - it didn't count. It's only when you eat in front of strangers or people that make you feel guilty that food is really fattening.