Quotes from Julian Barnes

It was like a country remembering its history: the past was never just the past, it was what made the present able to live with itself.

I don't believe in destiny, as I may have said. But I do believe now that when two lovers meet, there is already so much pre-history that only certain outcomes are possible. Whereas the lovers themselves imagine that the world is being reset, and that the possibilities are both new and infinite.

So (and this would have happened earlier, but I am only remembering it now): I am visiting her one afternoon.

Adrian also took charge of his own life, he took command of it, he took it in his hands—and then out of them. How few of us—we that remain—can say that we have done the same? We muddle along, we let life happen to us, we gradually build up a store of memories. There is the question of accumulation, but not in the sense that Adrian meant, just the simple adding up and adding on of life. And as the poet pointed out, there is a difference between addition and increase.

One test might be whether, as the years pass, you come out better from your own story, or worse. To come out worse might indicate that you are being more truthful. On the other hand, there is the danger of being retrospectively anti-heroic: making yourself out to have behaved worse than you actually did can be a form of self-praise.

Whereas it seemed to me, back then, in the absolutism of my condition, that love had nothing to do with practicality; indeed, was its polar opposite. And the fact that it showed contempt for such banal considerations was part of its glory. Love was by its very nature disruptive, cataclysmic; and if it was not, then it was not love.

He also loved candelabra.

Man's love is of man's life a thing apart / 'Tis woman's whole existence.

If I failed to display negatives, then positives would be assumed: this was how it worked.

Most of us have only one story to tell. I don't mean that only one thing happens to us in our lives: there are countless events, which we turn into countless stories. But there's only one that matters, only one finally worth telling. This is mine. Perhaps this is an illusion all lovers have about themselves: that they escape both category and description.

Se había imaginado que, en el mundo moderno, el tiempo y el lugar ya no eran importantes en las historias de amor. Al mirar atrás vio que habían desempeñado en la suya una función más grande de lo que había pensado. Había sucumbido a la antigua, continuada, indeleble ilusión: que de algún modo los amantes están fuera del tiempo.

Be approximately satisfied with approximate happiness. The only thing in life which is clear and beyond doubt is unhappiness

Do not imagine that art is something which is designed to give gentle uplift and self-confidence. Art is not a brassiere. At least, not in the English sense. But do not forget that brassiere is the French word for life-jacket

Had my life increased, or merely added to itself? This

Logiškai m?st?, o paskui elg?si logiška išvada. Ta?iau daugelis iš m?s?, ?tariu, daro priešingai: priima instinktyv? sprendim?, paskui kuria priežas?i? infrastrukt?r? jam pateisinti. O rezultat? pavadina sveiku protu.

It is only a metaphor—or the worst of dreams; yet there are metaphors which sit more powerfully in the brain than remembered events.

You put us on a pedestal in order to look up our skirts.

This being Europe, I felt it safe to kiss her on the cheek.

the letter he left for the coroner he had explained his reasoning: that life is a gift bestowed without anyone asking for it; that the thinking person has a philosophical duty to examine both the nature of life and the conditions it comes with; and that if this person decides to renounce the gift no one asks for, it is a moral and human duty to act on the consequences of that decision.

It is not just soldiers in the field who later suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder. It is often the inevitable consequence of a seemingly normal sublunary existence.

he certainly never regretted his love for Susan. What he did regret was that he had been too young, too ignorant, too absolutist, too confident of what he imagined love's nature and workings to be.

Vienas anglas yra pasak?s, kad santuoka yra ilgai trunkantis valgymas, kai pudingas paduodamas iš pradži?.

This was how you should love - without fear, without barriers, without thought for the morrow. And then, afterwards, without regret.

But if you're very clever, I think there's something that can unhinge you if you're not careful.