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There is nothing like staying at home for real comfort.
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“There is nothing like staying at home for real comfort.”

Jane Austen

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Source
Emma
Date
1815
Local voice
Fictional character · Mrs. Elton
Meaning

Meaning of “There is nothing like staying at home for…”

Home is valued not for spectacle but for familiarity, ease, and the freedom to lower one’s guard.

Source context

Where does it come from?

Emma, Volume II, Chapter XIV, scan-backed 1816 John Murray first edition on Wikisource. Mrs. Elton declares that there is nothing like staying at home for real comfort while boasting at length about her supposed devotion to home, Maple Grove and social independence; the comic context makes this fictional character speech rather than Austen’s unqualified domestic maxim.

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Speaker context

Why the local voice matters

Mrs. Elton says this in Emma while boasting about her supposed devotion to home.

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Themes

Ideas connected with this quotation

FamilyGratitudeHappinessJoyPositive Quotes About a Constructive OutlookShortSimplicityIntrovertWords of Wisdom: Practical & Philosophical Counsel
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Source identified
We've got Father and Mother, and each other.
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“We've got Father and Mother, and each other.”

Louisa May Alcott · Little Women · 1868
Voice: Fictional character · Beth March
Meaning & context

Beth answers material lack by naming the relationships the sisters still possess, turning family presence into a concrete reason for gratitude rather than denying hardship.

Source details

Little Women, Chapter 1, “Playing Pilgrims,” Project Gutenberg #514. Beth March answers her sisters’ complaints about poverty with “We’ve got Father and Mother, and each other,” naming family relationships as what remains available to them. This is Beth’s fictional dialogue inside the opening domestic scene.

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What’s the good of a home, if you are never in it?
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“What’s the good of a home, if you are never in it?”

George Grossmith and Weedon Grossmith · The Diary of a Nobody · 1892
Voice: Fictional narrator · Charles Pooter
Meaning & context

Pooter turns his preference for staying home into a miniature philosophy, funny because the diary repeatedly treats ordinary domestic habits as matters of high principle.

Source details

The Diary of a Nobody, Chapter I, before the dated diary entries; Project Gutenberg #1026. After describing The Laurels and its back garden, Charles Pooter says “What’s the good of a home, if you are never in it?” and makes “Home, Sweet Home” his motto. The sentence belongs to Pooter’s domestic self-characterization inside diary fiction rather than a general lifestyle rule from the Grossmith brothers.

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How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is to have a thankless child!
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“How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is to have a thankless child!”

William Shakespeare · King Lear · c. 1606
Voice: Fictional character · King Lear
Meaning & context

The image captures the particular hurt of care being answered by ingratitude within a close family bond.

Source details

King Lear, Act I, Scene IV, reviewed against the scan-backed First Folio facsimile. Lear's serpent's-tooth line occurs inside his curse against Goneril after the reduction of his retinue; it is angry dramatic speech, not a neutral rule about children or family relationships.

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