707 Quotes by Julian Barnes

I swiftly realised how grief sorts out and realigns those around the griefstruck; how friends are tested; how some pass, some fail. Old friendships may deepen through shared sorrow; or suddenly appear lightweight.

He thought logically, and then acted on the conclusion of logical thought. Whereas most of us, I suspect, do the opposite: we make an instinctive decision, then build up an infrastructure of reasoning to justify it.

I was deeply misled by Lady Chatterley’s Lover, which seemed to insist that running naked through damp undergrowth with wild flowers entwined in your pubic hair was just about the closest thing to heaven.

For Montaigne, the death of youth, which so often takes place unnoticed is the harder death; what we habitually refer to as ‘death’ is no more than the death of old age... The leap from the attenuated survival of senescence into nonexistence is much easier than the sly transition from heedless youth crabbed and regretful age.

The strong cannot help confronting; the less strong cannot help evading.

At times it feels as if life itself is the greatest loser, the true bereaved party, because it is no longer subjected to that radiant curiosity of hers.

It seemed... that intelligence wasn’t as pure and unalterable a characteristic as people believed. Being intelligent was like being good: you could be virtuous in one person’s company and yet wicked in another’s. You could be intelligent with one person and stupid with another. It was partly to do with confidence... In a way she had been more confident when she had been eighteen and foolish. At twenty-three, with Michael, she felt less confident and therefore less intelligent.

And you can never prepare for this new reality in which you have been dunked.

I certainly believe we all suffer damage, one way or another. How could we not, except in a world of perfect parents, siblings, neighbours, companions?