Geoffrey Spencer Madan was an English belletrist

Belles-lettres

Belles-lettres or belles lettres is a term that is used to describe a category of writing. A writer of belles-lettres is a belletrist. However, the boundaries of that category vary in different usages....

 and both a collector and a creator of aphorisms, many of which are recorded in his Notebooks.

Biography

Madan was the son of Falconer Madan

Falconer Madan

Falconer Madan was Librarian of the Bodleian Library of Oxford University.Falconer was the fifth son of George and Harriet Madan. He was educated at Marlborough College and Brasenose College, Oxford, where he took part in Oxford and Cambridge Chess matches in 1873 and 1874, and won the University...

, a Fellow of Brasenose College, Oxford

Brasenose College, Oxford

Brasenose College, originally Brazen Nose College , is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. As of 2006, it has an estimated financial endowment of £98m...

 and Bodley's Librarian

Bodley's Librarian

The head of the Bodleian Library, the main library at the University of Oxford, is known as Bodley's Librarian: Sir Thomas Bodley, as founder, gave his name to both the institution and the position. Although there had been a university library at Oxford since about 1320, it had declined by the end...

, by Frances Jane Hayter. He was educated at Summer Fields School

Summer Fields School

Summer Fields is a boys' independent preparatory school based in Summertown, Oxford, England.-History:Originally called Summerfield, it became a Boys' Preparatory School in 1864 with seven pupils. Its owner, Archibald Maclaren, was a fencing teacher who ran a gymnasium in Oxford; he himself was...

, Eton College

Eton College

Eton College, often referred to simply as Eton, is a British independent school for boys aged 13 to 18. It was founded in 1440 by King Henry VI as "The King's College of Our Lady of Eton besides Wyndsor"....

 (to which he won the top scholarship in 1907) and Balliol College, Oxford

Balliol College, Oxford

Balliol College , founded in 1263, is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England but founded by a family with strong Scottish connections....

. While still at Eton, he earned a day’s holiday for the whole school by the excellence of his account of Eton written in Herodotean

Herodotus

Herodotus was an ancient Greek historian who was born in Halicarnassus, Caria and lived in the 5th century BC . He has been called the "Father of History", and was the first historian known to collect his materials systematically, test their accuracy to a certain extent and arrange them in a...

 Greek and embarked on a correspondence and friendship with A. C. Benson

A. C. Benson

Arthur Christopher Benson was an English essayist, poet, and author and the 28th Master of Magdalene College, Cambridge....

.

At Balliol, Madan read Classics

Classics

Classics is the branch of the Humanities comprising the languages, literature, philosophy, history, art, archaeology and other culture of the ancient Mediterranean world ; especially Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome during Classical Antiquity Classics (sometimes encompassing Classical Studies or...

 and made a number of lifelong friends, including Harold Macmillan

Harold Macmillan

Maurice Harold Macmillan, 1st Earl of Stockton, OM, PC was Conservative Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 10 January 1957 to 18 October 1963....

, Cyril Asquith

Cyril Asquith, Baron Asquith of Bishopstone

Cyril Asquith, Baron Asquith of Bishopstone PC, QC was an English barrister, judge and law lord.Cyril Asquith was the fourth son of H. H. Asquith, later Prime Minister and subsequently Earl of Oxford and Asquith, from his first marriage, to Helen Kelsall Melland.He was educated at Winchester...

 and Ronald Knox

Ronald Knox

Ronald Arbuthnott Knox was an English priest, theologian and writer.-Life:Ronald Knox was born in Kibworth, Leicestershire, England into an Anglican family and was educated at Eton College, where he took the first scholarship in 1900 and Balliol College, Oxford, where again...

.

Madan’s university career was interrupted by the First World War: he was commissioned in the King’s Own Royal Lancaster Regiment

King's Own Royal Regiment (Lancaster)

The King's Own Royal Regiment was an infantry regiment of the line of the British Army, which served under various titles from 1680 to 1959. Its lineage is continued today by the Duke of Lancaster's Regiment.-History:...

 and was wounded in the Mesopotamian campaign

Mesopotamian Campaign

The Mesopotamian campaign was a campaign in the Middle Eastern theatre of World War I fought between the Allies represented by the British Empire, mostly troops from the Indian Empire, and the Central Powers, mostly of the Ottoman Empire.- Background :...

 in 1916.
Madan was employed for four years in the City between 1920 and 1924, but a private income enabled him to retire and to devote the remainder of his life to his interests, which included wine, old silver and (above all) books.

In 1919 Madan married Marjorie, the daughter of Sir Saxton Noble, Bt. Their daughter Nicola married Gordon Campbell

Gordon Campbell, Baron Campbell of Croy

Gordon Thomas Calthrop Campbell, Baron Campbell of Croy, MC, PC, DL , born in Lossiemouth, Moray, and a Scottish Conservative & Unionist politician....

, later Lord Campbell of Croy.

He died suddenly in London on 6 July 1947.

The Notebooks

Madan had an unerring eye for aphorisms and each Christmas between 1929 and 1933 sent a small anthology from his notebooks to his friends. A limited typescript edition was circulated privately in 1949, after his death, and a further selection was made for an edition published by the Oxford University Press

Oxford University Press

Oxford University Press is the largest university press in the world. It is a department of the University of Oxford and is governed by a group of 15 academics appointed by the Vice-Chancellor known as the Delegates of the Press. They are headed by the Secretary to the Delegates, who serves as...

 in 1981. The editors (J.A.Gere and John Sparrow

John Hanbury Angus Sparrow

John Sparrow was an English academic, barrister, book-collector and Warden of All Souls College, Oxford from 1952-77.-Early life and education:...

) provided a biographical introduction and Harold Macmillan contributed a foreword.

The New York Review of Books called the Notebooks “the best example of a twentieth-century Commonplace book”.

Examples of his published aphorisms include:

• “The dust of exploded beliefs may make a fine sunset”.
• "Alive, in the sense that he can't legally be buried".
• "Never assume that habitual silence means ability in reserve".