118 quotes
Consider this point carefully: nowadays, suicide is just a way of disappearing. It is carried out timidly, quietly, and falls flat. It is no longer an action, only a submission.
This Business of Living (1935)
That war in which I had been sheltering, convinced of having accepted it, of having made my own uncomfortable peace, grew more ferocious, bit deeper, reached into one's nerves and brain.
The House on the Hill (1949)
We were at the age when a friend's conversation seems like oneself talking, when one shares a life in common the way I still think, bachelor though I am, some married couples are able to live.
The Beach (1941)
There comes a day when, for someone who has persecuted us, we feel only indifference, a weariness at his stupidity. Then we forgive him.
This Business of Living (1935)
It is not the actual enjoyment of pleasure that we desire. What we want is to test the futility of that pleasure, so as to be no longer obsessed by it.
This Business of Living (1935)
I realised that Nuto was quite right when he said that to live in a hovel or in a palace was one and the same thing, that blood is the same colour everywhere, and that everybody wants to be rich and in love and make their fortune.
The Moon and the Bonfire (1950)
The courage to stand alone as if others didn't exist and think only of what you're doing. Not to get scared if people ignore you. You have to wait for years, have to die. Then after you're dead, if you're lucky, you become somebody.
The House on the Hill (1949)
He told them it was only dogs that bark and go for strange dogs, and men set on a dog because it suits them to show that they are still masters, but if the dogs weren't dumb animals they would come to an agreements with each other and start barking at them.
The Moon and the Bonfire (1950)
When a man mourns for someone who has played him false, it is not for love of her, but for his own humiliation at not having deserved her trust.
This Business of Living (1935)
We do not remember days, we remember moments.
This Business of Living (1935)
We obtain things when we no longer want them.
This Business of Living (1935)
When one has made a mistake, one says. "Another time I shall know what to do," when one should say is: "I already know what I shall really do another time."
This Business of Living (1935)
We want Realism's wealth of experience and Symbolism's depth of feeling. All art is a problem of balance between two opposites.
This Business of Living (1935)
There's nothing that tastes of death more than the summer sun, the powerful light, exuberant nature. You sniff the air and listen to the woods and know that the plants and animals don't give a damn about you. Everything lives and consumes itself. Nature is death...
The Devil in the Hills (1949)
Things which cost nothing are those which cost the most. Why? Because they cost us the effort of understanding that they are free.
This Business of Living (1935)
I've discovered nothing. but do you remember how much we talked when we were boys? We talked just for the fun of it. We knew very well it was only talk, but still we enjoyed it.
The Beach (1941)
Nuto, who had never really gone away, still wanted to understand the world and change it, and upset the cycle of the seasons. Or perhaps he didn't, and still believed only in the moon. But I, who didn't believe in the moon, knew that when all was said and done only the seasons matter and they are in your bones and they nurtured you when you were a boy.
The Moon and the Bonfire (1950)
The problems that agitate one generation are exstinguished for the next, not because they have been solved but because the general lack of interest sweeps them away.
This Business of Living (1935)
Great lovers will always be unhappy, because, for them, love is of supreme importance. Consequently they demand of their beloved the same intensity of thought as they have for her, otherwise they feel betrayed.
This Business of Living (1935)
Why does a man who is truly in love insist that this relationship must continue and be "lifelong"? Because life is pain and the enjoyment of love is an anesthetic. Who would want to wake up halfway through an operation?
This Business of Living (1935)