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Loneliness Quotes

Browse 4676 quotes about Loneliness.

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Loneliness Quotes

“The telephone conversation is, by its very nature, reactive, not reflective. Immediacy is its prime virtue. ... The letter, written in absorbed solitude, is an act of faith: it assumes the presence of humanity: world and self are generated from within: loneliness is courted, not feared. To write a letter is to be alone with my thoughts in the conjured presence of another person. I keep myself imaginative company. I occupy the empty room.”

WorldWritingPersonsSelfHumanityRoomsCompanyVirtueWrittenLonelinessSolitudeConversationEmptyLettersAssumingPrimeTelephonesMy ThoughtsImaginativeImmediacyEmpty Rooms
Author:Vivian Gornick
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“When we look within ourselves with psilocybin, we discover that we do not have to look outward toward the futile promise of life that circles distant stars in order to still our cosmic loneliness. We should look within; the paths of the heart lead to nearby universes full of life and affection for humanity.”

ShouldLooksHeartStillsHumanityOrderUniverseStarsPathLonelinessPromiseAffectionCirclesCosmicPsychedelicPsilocybin
Book:True Hallucinations: And, the Archaic Revival
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“Poetry is, above all, a singing art of natural and magical connection because, though it is born out of one's person's solitude, it has the ability to reach out and touch in a humane and warmly illuminating way the solitude, even the loneliness, of others. That is why, to me, poetry is one of the most vital treasures that humanity possesses; it is a bridge between separated souls.”

WayPersonsArtSoulHumanityBornNaturalAbilityLonelinessSolitudeSingingConnectionsTreasureBridgesPoetry IsReach OutHumaneIlluminating
Author:Brendan Kennelly
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“There is a horrifying loneliness at work in this time. No, listen to me. We lived six and seven to a room in those days, when I was still among the living. The city streets were seas of humanity; and now in these high buildings dim-witted souls hover in luxurious privacy, gazing through the television window at a faraway world of kissing and touching. It is bound to produce some great fund of common knowledge, some new level of human awareness, a curious skepticism, to be so alone.”

WorldHumansStillsSoulHumanityLevelsRoomsCommonCitiesSeaStreetsAwarenessLonelinessProduceTelevisionBuildingKissingSixWindowSevenBoundsCuriousPrivacyFundTouchingSkepticismListen To MeGazingLuxuriousCity StreetsCommon Knowledge
Book:The Queen of the Damned
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“Man was born for society. However little He may be attached to the World, He never can wholly forget it, or bear to be wholly forgotten by it. Disgusted at the guilt or absurdity of Mankind, the Misanthrope flies from it: He resolves to become an Hermit, and buries himself in the Cavern of some gloomy Rock. While Hate inflames his bosom, possibly He may feel contented with his situation: But when his passions begin to cool; when Time has mellowed his sorrows, and healed those wounds which He bore with him to his solitude, think you that Content becomes his Companion? Ah! no, Rosario. No longer sustained by the violence of his passions, He feels all the monotony of his way of living, and his heart becomes the prey of Ennui and weariness. He looks round, and finds himself alone in the Universe: The love of society revives in his bosom, and He pants to return to that world which He has abandoned. Nature loses all her charms in his eyes: No one is near him to point out her beauties, or share in his admiration of her excellence and variety. Propped upon the fragment of some Rock, He gazes upon the tumbling waterfall with a vacant eye, He views without emotion the glory of the setting Sun. Slowly He returns to his Cell at Evening, for no one there is anxious for his arrival; He has no comfort in his solitary unsavoury meal: He throws himself upon his couch of Moss despondent and dissatisfied, and wakes only to pass a day as joyless, as monotonous as the former.”

PhilosophyHumanitySocietyHuman NatureLonelinessIndependenceRejectionIsolationContentmentCompanionshipHopelessnessMonotonyHermitsMisanthropySeclusionDiscontentmentHermitReclusion
Book:The Monk
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“The pub. It remained the only place in the world that had not evolved into anything more sophisticated. The buildings rose, the towers hit never- ending growth spurts, the concrete sidewalks turned to polycarbonate glass billboards, and the cars drove people. But the pubs—the pubs with their gritty melancholy—endured time. No matter how advanced this species grew to be, the human heart was never short of confusion and in need of the rugged, little lullaby of alcohol and alone time.”

HumanitySocietyLonelinessEvolutionHeartbreakDrinkingIsolationPubsThe Goodbye SongThe Future
Book:The Goodbye Song
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“What is it that drew us to the hollow tonight? What crazy kind of species is it that leaves a warm home on a rainy night to ferry salamanders across a road? It's tempting to call it altruism, but it's not. There is nothing selfless about it. This night heaps rewards on the givers as well as the recipients. We get to be there, to witness this amazing rite, and, for an evening, to enter into relationship with other beings, as different from ourselves as we can imagine. It has been said that people of the modern world suffer a great sadness, a "species loneliness" - estrangement from the rest of Creation. We have built this isolation with our fear, with our arrogance, and with our homes brightly lit against the night. For a moment as we walked this road, those barriers dissolved and we began to relieve the loneliness and know each other once again.”

HumanityNatureSadnessLonelinessBiologyNaturalismNaturalistSpecies Loneliness
Book:Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants
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“Yet there are times when for no logical reason I feel an almost unbearable sense of isolation. Not only am I divided in myself, my underwater and above-water selves separated, but I feel wrenched away from everybody around me. This is part of being human, this knowing that we are all part of one another, inextricably involved; and at the same time alone, irrevocably alone.”

PainHumanityCommunityLossGriefHuman NatureLonelinessIsolation
Book:The Summer of the Great-Grandmother
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“True loneliness is the comet traveling alone through the universe, surrounded by vacuous space and nothingness at absolute zero. It would never have the chance to be seen by someone or approached by another. This dismal silence would simply continue for eons.”

HumanityLonelinessExistentialism
Book:文豪ストレイドッグス ＳＴＯＲＭ ＢＲＩＮＧＥＲ [Bungō Stray Dogs: Storm Bringer]
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“When he has finished his morning round, Bartholomew is tired and feels lonely. There is still a little time before lunch, and instead of returning to Brother Alice's empty office, he gives himself permission to visit the gardens. He hungers for the sight of birds, he wants to hear the leaves whisper around him and to sit so still the birds accept him as a shrub. He wants the birds to land on his limbs and mistake his eyes for berries. In this cold dry space between seasons, few birds remain. No snow has fallen yet, but the ducks and geese and hummingbirds are gone, while Bartholomew, bound to his clock and trapped inside, has missed their going, the shape and sound of their flight. A few crows and sparrows are the most he hopes to find as he wheels himself into his blind between bushes, birds as ordinary and steadfast as he is himself. The white sky is birdless above him and the wind's small dirge the only song he hears. Deeply he breathes and listens closely inside himself for his own heartbeat, for the clock that keeps his body's time. Eyes closed, he tries to clean his mind of images and of the voices that would tell him he should not be sitting here, that he is a thief of time, or that the Fathers know of and will punish the theft. He breathes and does not mark his breaths with numbers, only in-out, in-out, until he hears the hum of blood in his ears and the inside of his mind is a uniform, cool gray, unmarked by shadows. He waits for birds, but does not name his waiting. His eyes open, his breathing shallows and he hears the wind. Listens, embodied now, with tension in his body. The moan comes again, is fainter. Waits two, three, four. The source is very near him. He moves his chair from the blind and circles the bushes slowly. The voice cries again, and this time, he knows it calls to him. On the ground, which is black and dry, half hidden in the tangle of oldest, lowest branches, bare of leaves, a crow rests, wings pulled tight against its body, impersonating a black stone. The crow's head inclines toward one shoulder, the black dot of an eye regards him and shares its knowledge: I am dying. It is my time to die. The moan now is almost beyond hearing, a soft deep sound free both of anger and of pain. It is too late to speak or intervene. Bartholomew is chosen witness and he watches the death, silent and simple and wholly terrifying. The last breath is released, the bird-heart stops its beating, the film of a lid closing hides the round eye, the black head slumps to rest against the wing, and Bartholomew breathes slowly, without moving, and binds his mind to blankness. If a spirit leaves, he does not see or hear or feel it go. If he has a soul himself, it does not stir. The death of the crow defeats the Fathers' time. At last the lunch bell rings, and it almost surprises him to find he is alive, his body capable of hunger and of obedience to bells. His hands fly automatically to the controls of his chair, automatically he leaves the garden and steers toward the dining hall, looking back only once to the still black form, mostly obscured by branches. The great room is warm and full of people talking, laughing, eating, all oblivious to death, and what separates him from them, what makes him lonely in their company is his awareness that they each and all must die.”

DeathHumanityNatureExistenceAwarenessLonelinessSolitudeMindfulnessObservationMortality
Book:Conscience Place
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“Even now, I like to look in the mirror. Over the years, I’ve followed the progress of the wrinkles furrowing my brow. My cheeks have grown thinner and my lips have become pale, but it’s all me and I feel a sort of fondness for the reflection in the mirror. [...] I was just over forty. That was twenty-two years ago. I suppose I am an old woman, but I still love looking at my face. I don’t know if it’s beautiful or ugly, but it is the only human face I ever see. I smile at it and receive a friendly smile back.”

HumanityLonelinessVanity
Book:I Who Have Never Known Men
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“[The Gaze of an Invisible Stranger] In western Europe and north America In the cities of cruelty, racism, freedom & democracy, Cities of exile and alienation, You see many young people Who’d rather die than greet a stranger, You observe how they master the art of ignoring And not acknowledging the humanity of anyone Who is not their height and weight Whose features, skin color, and eyes are different than theirs… In return, you observe cities filled with older people Who delight at a nod or greeting from any stranger Who are hungry for the slightest kind human touch From any by passerby… Making you, the Invisible Stranger, wonder: Did these same elderly folks raise the young ones? Are they merely inheriting a world of their creation? Do the young ones realize The isolation, loneliness, and desolation awaiting them tomorrow? [Original poem published in Arabic on January 3, 2023, at ahewar.org]”

HumanityCommunityCompassionLonelinessRacismAgingExclusionOlder PeopleArabic PoetryAgism
Author:Louis Yako
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“Andrei perched on the rooftop of the cinema and looked out at Westwood’s nightlife bustling before him. He was mounted on the single, cream, stoned gargoyle built above in the corner of the theatre. He and his gothic animal breathed under the cold moon. Yes. He always felt like the moon—generally unnoticed by the world, that never minds—and navigated richly through his life alone and uninterrupted, like a ghost. Truth is an unobvious color. Those who attempt truth will never make billboards or conversations but usually sift in the background in awkward veritas.”

CharacterTruthHumanitySocietyLonelinessIdentitySolitudeGhostsMasculinityVeritas
Book:A Happy Ghost
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