27 quotes
Irish-born British writer and philosopher (1919–1999)
“There is no beyond, there is only here, the infinitely small, infinitely great and utterly demanding present.”
"Love is the extremely difficult realization that something other than oneself is real."
on Love
"Love is the difficult realization that something other than oneself is real."
"Our actions are like ships which we may watch set out to sea, and not know when or with what cargo they will return to port."
on Philosophy
"We can only learn to love by loving."
"People from a planet without flowers would think we must be mad with joy the whole time to have such things about us."
on Joy
"We brought nothing into this world and it is certain we can carry nothing out."
on Death
"The most potent and sacred command which can be laid upon any artist is the command: wait."
on Art
"There is no substitute for the comfort supplied by the utterly taken-for-granted relationship."
on Relationships
"Perhaps when distant people on other planets pick up some wavelength of ours all they hear is a continuous scream."
"Art is the final cunning of the human soul which would rather do anything than face the gods."
"One doesn't have to get anywhere in a marriage. It's not a public conveyance."
"Bereavement is a darkness impenetrable to the imagination of the unbereaved"
"Writing is like getting married. One should never commit oneself until one is amazed at one's luck."
on Writing
"Artists are indeed unlikely to be good, goodness would silence them."
"Only the very greatest art invigorates without consoling."
"All art is a struggle to be, in a particular sort of way, virtuous."
"Happiness is a matter of one's most ordinary and everyday mode of consciousness being busy and lively and unconcerned with self."
on Happiness
"Falling out of love is chiefly a matter of forgetting how charming someone is."
"Mercifully one forgets one's love affairs as one forgets one's dreams."
"Between saying and doing, many a pair of shoes is worn out."
on Wisdom