Quotes About Solitude

Alone let him constantly meditate in solitude on that which is salutary for his soul, for he who meditates in solitude attains supreme bliss.

One can never know for sure what a deserted area looks like.

I'm sure people think that I'm out in left field you know, playing by myself.

If you're a surfer, you just want to surf. You don't know if anyone's going to see you, and you don't really care if they see you. You just live for that feeling.

I'm quiet and introverted, and I like to just be by myself a lot. I like to read and just get away and surf. I have a lot of alone time.

In a sense, I'm always hearing music of some sort, whether it's people talking or surface noise or whatever, because there is no privacy. So when I'm by myself, I just kind of like to be and reflect, and I can't do that when I'm listening to music. Because it's someone else's reflections, not mine.

The rule of surfing is never tell anyone where you go.

I like the busy-ness of office life. What I discovered, to my surprise, is that I love the solitary nature of writing. What happens is that you write when you're ready.

It's true that it's a solitary occupation, but you would be surprised at how much companionship a group of imaginary characters can offer once you get to know them.

To be inside an abandoned mall is surreal. Often times I feel like I'm the last person alive on the planet.

It is a little bit surreal to know that you are in your own little spaceship, and a few inches from you is instant death.

I do, indeed, close my door at times and surrender myself to a book, but only because I can open the door again and see a human face looking at me.

I don't have a battery of agents to surround me in a cocoon.

But as I sat in that bed, the book in my hands, the city outside silent, I had reason to feel as if a hand from some sub-zero hell had reached up and laid itself-oh, very gently-upon my heart.

In short, everything about his life was different for him at the bottom of that well.

Grief Woke up early this morning and from my bed looked far across the Strait to see a small boat moving through the choppy water, a single running light on. Remembered my friend who used to shout his dead wife's name from hilltops around Perugia. Who set a plate for her at his simple table long after she was gone. And opened the windows so she could have fresh air. Such display I found embarrassing. So did his other friends. I couldn't see it. Not until this morning.

Years later, I still wanted to give up friends, love, starry skies, fora house where no one was home, no one coming back, and all I could drink.

I thought for a minute of the world outside my house, and then I didn't have any more thoughts except the thought that I had to hurry up and sleep.

years later, I still wanted to give up friend, love, starry skies, for a house where no one was home, no one coming back, and all I could drink.

A really good detective never gets married.

I have a sense of exile from thought, a nostalgia of the quiet room and balanced mind. I am a writer, and there comes a time when that which I write has to belong to me, has to be written alone and in silence, with no one looking over my shoulder, no one telling me a better way to write it. It doesn't have to be great writing, it doesn't even have to be terribly good. It just has to be mine.

I didn't mind what she called me, what anybody called me. But this was the room I had to live in. It was all I had in the way of a home. In it was everything that was mine, that had any association for me, any past, anything that took the place of a family. Not much: a few books, pictures, radio, chessmen, old letters, stuff like that. Nothing. Such as they were, they had all my memories.

He turned and walked across the floor and out. I watched the door close. I listened to his steps going away down the imitation marble corridor. After a while they got faint, then they got silent. I kept on listening anyway.

After a moment I pushed my chair back and went over to the french windows. I opened the screens and stepped out on to the porch. The night was all around, soft and quiet. The white moonlight was cold and clear, like the justice we dream of but don't find.