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John Fowles

John Fowles Quotes

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Famous John Fowles Quotes

“People won't admit it, they're too busy grabbing to see that the lights have fused. They can't see the darkness and the spider-face beyond and the great web of it all. That there's always this if you scratch at the surface of happiness and goodness. The black and the black and the black.”

PeopleHappinessBlackDarkDarknessGoodnessSurfaceHappyGoodDistractionDistractedSeeGrabbingBeyondLightsWebSpiderAdmitScratchGrabFused
Book:The Collector
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“I hate people who collect things and classify things and give them names and then forget all about them. That’s what people are always doing in art. They call a painter an impressionist or a cubist or something and then they put him in a drawer and don’t see him as a living individual painter any more.”

PeopleArtHateNamesIndividualForgetLivingPainterCollectorsImpressionismCubismNamingCollectClassifyDrawerImpressionistCubist
Book:The Collector
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“Even more ominous ... is the fact that since the Second World War a new kind of intellectual has emerged in large numbers. ... he is only minimally interested in the proper intellectual significance of images and objects. Such people are not really intellectuals, but visuals ... A visual is more interested in style than in content ... A visual does not feel a rioting crowd being machine-gunned by the police, he simply sees a brilliant news photograph.”

PeopleWorldFeelsKindDoeWarFactsNumbersStyleObjectsNewsIntellectualMachinesPolicePhotographCrowdsBrilliantWar Of The WorldsVisualsSignificanceLarge NumbersSecond World WarOminousRioting
Author:John Fowles
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“The bowed head, the buried face. She is silent, she will never speak, never forgive, never reach a hand, never leave this frozen present tense. All waits, suspended. Suspended the autumn trees, the autumn sky, anonymous people. A blackbird, poor fool, sings out of season from the willows by the lake. A flight of pigeons over the houses; fragments of freedom, hazard, an anagram made flesh. And somewhere the stinging smell of burning leaves.”

PeopleMadeHandsFacesHouseSpeakWaitingPoorTreeSkyFoolSeasonsForgivingSilentSmellFleshFlightBurningLakesAutumnBuriedFrozenFragmentsTenseHazardsSuspendedPigeonsNever ForgivePresent TenseBlackbirdsAnagrams
Author:John Fowles
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“We lay on the ground and kissed. Perhaps you smile. That we only lay on the ground and kissed. You young people can lend your bodies now, play with them, give them as we could not. But remember that you have paid a price: that of a world rich in mystery and delicate emotion. It is not only species of animal that die out. But whole species of feeling. And if you are wise you will never pity the past for what it did not know. But pity yourself for what it did.”

PeopleIfsKnowsWorldGivingPlayWholeFeelingsBodyPastRememberYoungDiesAnimalEmotionRichWiseMysteryPaidLaysSpeciesYour BodyPityDelicate
Author:John Fowles
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“People knew less of each other, perhaps, but they felt more free of each other, and so were more individual. The entire world was not for them only a push or a switch away. Strangers were strange, and sometimes with an exciting, beautiful strangeness. It may be better for humanity that we should communicate more and more.”

PeopleThinkingWorldShouldMaySometimesBeautifulHumanityIndividualSpaceGreaterToo MuchStrangeExcitingCommunicateStrangerEnjoyedIsolationAncestorHereticStrangenessEnvied
Author:John Fowles
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