Quotes About Ambiguity

Richard Abbott, who I thought knew everything, answered: "I don't know, exactly.

The Harry Lime Theme"—

but when I look at you now, I don't know who you are." I told her I occasionally had the same feeling about myself.

Graham Greene

consistency, a virtue I have always deplored.

None of this excuses anyone from mastering the basic ideas and terminology of economics. The intelligent layman must expect also to encounter good economists who are difficult writers even though some of the best have been very good writers. He should know, moreover, that at least for a few great men ambiguity of expression has been a positive asset. But with these exceptions he may safely conclude that what is wholly mysterious in economics is not likely to be important.

There were several trees bleakly reaching into the fog. Any one of them might have been the one I was looking for.

But there are times you pull something out of the water for which there's no accounting, the only remnant of a story whose contours are a mystery.

In Spanish, the word esposas means both 'wives' and 'handcuffs'.

What we need is a treasure house, not of knowledge, but of ignorance. Something that gives not answers but questions. Something that shines light, not on already garish facts, but into the dark, damp corners of ignorance. And

You should never, ever be understood completely. That's like the kiss of death, isn't it? It's a full stop. I don't ever think you should put full stops on thoughts. They change.

When asked to spell Mississippi the boy asked "The river or the state?"

Every ambiguous, false, tearful, emotional exaggeration brings about that typically kitsch attitude which could be defined as "sentimentality."

She looks like a woman who has found it ridiculous to commit herself to a single emotional stance in anything, but must always ride high heavy irony.

It's not like I'm narrating stories with music behind them. It's all kind of one thing. You hope you can provoke a specific emotional reaction, but in ways that aren't quite plain.

Some wits, too, like oracles, deal in ambiguities, but not with equal success; for though ambiguities are the first excellence of an imposter, they are the last of a wit.

In the revolt against idealism, the ambiguities of the word experience have been perceived, with the result that realists have more and more avoided the word.

Lots of things were there [in the seventies], in the social experience, but not quite named, lurking like a stranger on the edge of the playground.

Failure is my best friend. If I succeeded, it would be like dying. Maybe worse.

Yes, success is everything. Failure is more common. Most achieve a sort of middling thing, but fortunately one's situation is always blurred, you never know absolutely quite where you are.

The chance of failure is almost always better than the guarantee of never knowing.

No perfect solution is, not merely in practice, but in principle, possible in human affairs, and any determined attempt to produce it is likely to lead to suffering, disillusionment and failure.

So we gave up. I'd finally had enough of chasing after a ghost who did not want to be seen. We'd failed, maybe, but some mysteries aren't meant to be solved.

No matter which way we go, it is no better than any other. It is all the same whether you achieve something or not, have faith or not, just as it is all the same whether you cry or remain silent.