1,104 Quotes by Jeanette Winterson

Zel so often put himself outside of where he wanted to be and then looked in dumbly through the window of his longing, hurt and beaten and knowing that he had hurt and beaten himself but still he did it, over and over.

your morse code interferes with my heart beat. I had a steady heart before you, I replied upon it, it had seen active service and grown strong. Now you alter its pace with your own rhythm you play upon me, drumming me taught.

My own heart, like this wild place, has never been visited, and I do not know whether it could sustain life.

the buddhists say there are 149 ways to god. i'm not looking for god, only for myself, and that is far more complicated.

What is 'no'? Either you have asked the wrong question or you have asked the wrong person. Find a way to get the 'yes'.

Life…we understand it differently at different stages. It’s what is interesting about getting older, you realize your relationship with the past is always negotiable. There is a lot of freedom in that, because you realize you can go back to what you did such a long time ago. You can talk with the dead, talk with your lost self, your disappeared self, and you can visit those places again, and understand it differently. That makes a huge difference.

He did not say so, but the words behind the words told me that he would rather have launched me into a good marriage than watch me row against the tide at my own work. It remains that a woman with an incomplete emotional life has herself to blame, while a man with no time for his heart just needs a wife.

He liked city walking. He didn't want to have to go to that place called countryside to take a walk. He wanted to stuff his hands in his pockets, set his internal compass vaguely east or south and wander till he was tired enough to get the bus home.

A good job, money, more money, travel, happiness. Christmas-time swivelled the lens and brought these things into focus. If you had some, all, any of these things you could feel especially pleased with yourself over the twelve days of feasting and family. If you didn't have some, all, any of these things you felt the lack more keenly. You felt like an outsider.