Home / Quotes / Quote by Colin Wilson

Quote by Colin Wilson

“I've always believed that a writer has got to remain an outsider. If I was offered anything like the Nobel Prize for Literature, I'd find it an extremely difficult conflict because I'd be basically disinclined to accept.”

Quote by Colin Wilson

Author

Colin Wilson, a British writer born on June 26, 1931, and died on December 5, 2013. His works spanned across various disciplines including philosophy, psychology, criminology, and literary criticism. He is known for his unique perspective and in-depth analysis. more

You May Also Like

“The Americans have always been more open to my ideas. In fact, I could earn a living in America just by lecturing. One of my brightest audiences, incidentally, were the prisoners in a Philadelphia gaol - brighter than my students at university.”

Ideas Facts America Audience Students University Prisoner Brighter Philadelphia Lecturing

Author:Colin Wilson

“The self-surmounter can never put up with the man who has ceased to be dissatisfied with himself.”

Men Self He Man Dissatisfied

Book:The Outsider

Source: The Outsider

“Sexual activity is driven by the same aims and motives as reading poetry or listening to music: to escape the limitations imposed by the need for particularity in the consciousness.”

Needs Reading Consciousness Listening Activity Aim Driven Limitation Motive Listening To Music Reading Poetry

Author:Colin Wilson

“The effects of mescalin or LSD can be, in some respects, far more satisfying than those of alcohol. To begin with, they last longer; they also leave behind no hangover, and leave the mental faculties clear and unimpaired. They stimulate the faculties and produce the ideal ground for a peak experience.”

Lasts Behinds Clear Effects Produce Ideals Alcohol Faculty Satisfying Hangover Lsd Peak Experiences

Author:Colin Wilson

“Phenomenology is not a philosophy; it is a philosophical method, a tool. It is like an adjustable spanner that can be used for dismantling a refrigerator or a car, or used for hammering in nails, or even for knocking somebody out.”

Philosophy Used Car Tools Philosophical Method Nails Knocking Refrigerators Phenomenology

Author:Colin Wilson

“We can't plan life. All we can do is be available for it.”

Life Motivational Can Do Plans Inspirational Life Available This Life Live Life Challange

Author:Lauryn Hill

“Now the basic impulse behind existentialism is optimistic, very much like the impulse behind all science. Existentialism is romanticism, and romanticism is the feeling that man is not the mere he has always taken himself for. Romanticism began as a tremendous surge of optimism about the stature of man. Its aim - like that of science - was to raise man above the muddled feelings and impulses of his everyday humanity, and to make him a god-like observer of human existence.”

Men Humans Feelings Humanity Behinds Existence Taken Optimism Aim Raises Mere Everyday Optimistic Impulse Existentialism Observers Human Existence Romanticism Stature

Author:Colin Wilson

“I was aggressively nonpolitical. I believed that people who make a fuss about politics do so because their heads are too empty to think about more important things. So I felt nothing but impatient contempt for Osborne's Jimmy Porter and the rest of the heroes of social protest.”

People Thinking Important Social Felt Hero Empty Important Things Protest Contempt Impatient Jimmy

Book:The Outsider

Source: The Outsider

“I had never doubted my own abilities, but I was quite prepared to believe that "the world" would decline to recognize them.”

World Believe My Own Ability Prepared Decline Doubted

Book:The Outsider

Source: The Outsider

“The mystical impulse in men is somehow a desire to possess the universe. In women, it's a desire to be possessed.”

Men Desire Universe Impulse Possessed Mystical

Author:Colin Wilson