707 Quotes by Julian Barnes

This was long before the term 'single-parent family' came into use; back then it was a 'broken home'...

I would have to go back into my past and deal with Adrian. My philosopher friend, who gazed on life and decided that any responsible, thinking individual should have the right to reject this gift that had never been asked for - and whose noble gesture re-emphasised with each passing decade the compromise and littleness that most lives consist of. 'Most lives': my life.

After a long analysis of Robson’s suicide, we concluded that it could only be considered philosophical in an arithmetical sense of the term: he, being about to cause an increase of one in the human population, had decided it was his ethical duty to keep the planet’s numbers constant.

Women scheme when they are weak, they lie out of fear. Men scheme when they are strong, they lie out of arrogance.

He felt life more clearly too—even, perhaps especially, when he came to decide that it wasn't worth the candle.

Is despair wrong? Isn’t it the natural condition of life after a certain age? … After a number of events, what is there left but repetition and diminishment? Who wants to go on living? The eccentric, the religious, the artistic (sometimes); those with a false sense of their own worth. Soft cheeses collapse; firm cheeses indurate. Both go mouldy.

Most people, in my opinion, steal much of what they are. If they didn't what poor items they would be.

Though why should we expect age to mellow us? If it isn't life's business to reward merit, why should it be life's business to give us warm, comfortable feelings towards its end? What possible evolutionary purpose could nostalgia serve?

...marriage is a long dull meal with the pudding served first.