Three Literary Tributes to the English ...

Pytheas, Greek geographer (325-285 BCE) said:

The inhabitants of Britain are said to be sprung from the soil and to preserve a primitive lifestyle...They are simple in their habits and far removed from the cunning and knavishness of modern man. Their diet is inexpensive and quite different from the luxury that is born of wealth. The island is thickly populated, and has an extremely chilly climate, as one would expect in a sub-Arctic region.

Karel Capek, Czech novelist (1890-1938) said:

Every Englishman wears a mackintosh, and has a cap on his head and a newspaper in his hand. As for the Englishwoman, she carries a mackintosh or a tennis racket. Nature here has a propensity for unusual shagginess...and all kinds of hair; English horses, for example, have regular tufts and tassels of hair on their legs, and English dogs are nothing more nor less than absurd bundles of forelocks. Only the English lawn and the English gentleman are shaved every day...

Paul Theroux, American Author (1941- ) said:

They wallpaper their ceilings! They put little bobble-hats on their soft-boiled eggs to keep them warm! They don't give you bags in supermarkets! They say sorry when they step on your toes! Their government makes them get a hundred dollar license every year for watching television...They call their houses 'Homleigh' and 'Sparrow View'! They sunbathe in their underwear! They don't say 'You're welcome'...They have amazing names, like Mr. Eatwell, and Lady Inkpen, and Major Twaddle and Miss Tosh! And they think we're funny?