Quotes from Tim Winton

There is nowhere else I'd rather be, nothing else I would prefer to be doing. I am at the beach looking west with the continent behind me as the sun tracks down to the sea. I have my bearings.

The ocean is a supreme metaphor for change. I expect the unexpected but am never fully prepared.

For every moment the sea is peace and relief, there is another when it shivers and stirs to become chaos. It's just as ready to claim as it is to offer.

I came home at dusk with my ears ringing from the quiet.

Humour is God's special gift to humanity. Handy, because it turns out to be necessary.

The health of our seas determines the future of humanity.

Hunting and gathering are in my blood. But I've lived long enough to witness a diminution in the seas, and to notice a fragility where once I saw - or assumed - an endless bounty.

The desert is a spiritual place, we vaguely understand, and the sea the mere playground of our hedonism.

It's impossible to imagine what Australia would be like without surfing.

People can make symbolic gestures but doesn't mean their life changes. One philanthropic moment doesn't make a life of renewal; of change.

Surfers are the canaries down the mine. Those of us who surf spend more time than anyone soaking in whatever the sea has become. We're suspended in consequences, you might say.

It's the pointless things that give your life meaning. Friendship, compassion, art, love. All of them pointless. But they're what keeps life from being meaningless.

And you can't help but worry for them, love them, want for them - those who go on down the close, foetid galleries of time and space without you.

If we love the sea as much as we claim to we'll do everything we possibly can to keep it healthy. Otherwise we might as well take up golf.

The end of the world begins in the sea we love.

The notion that love is abroad in the world has shaped my life.

Surfing is one of the most joyful pursuits a human can take up. But there's no joy in a deadzone. If you've ever surfed in turds and medical waste you don't want to repeat the experience.

Who wants to be reputable? That's for golfers and tycoons with a sleazy past.

It's the pointless things that give your life meaning. Friendship, Compassion, Art, Love. All of them are pointless. But, they're what keeps life from being meaningless.

I still judge every joyous moment, every victory and revelation against those few seconds of living

Hoping is what people do when they're too lazy to do anything else. People

Shit, he said as a great, green glut of water poured up at our feet. I wonder what the ordinary people are doin today.

Time doesn't click on and on at the stroke. It comes and goes in waves and folds like water; it flutters and sifts like dust, rises, billows, falls back on itself. When a wave breaks, the water is not moving. The swell has traveled great distances but only the energy is moving, not the waves. Perhaps time moves through us and not through it.

I have never been a violent man. Just a little creepy, it seems.