Julian Barnes quotes

When you read a great book, you don't escape from life, you plunge deeper into it. (Julian Barnes)
I don't believe in God, but I miss him. View quote
Julian Barnes
History isn't what happened, history is just what historians tell us. View quote
Julian Barnes
Women were brought up to believe that men were the answer. They weren't. They weren't even one of the questions. View quote
Julian Barnes
History isn't the lies of the victors, as I once glibly assured Old Joe Hunt; I know that now. It's more the memories of the survivors, most of whom are neither victorious or defeated. View quote
Julian Barnes
That's one of the central problems of history, isn't it, sir? The question of subjective versus objective interpretation, the fact that we need to know the history of the historian in order to understand the version that is being put in front of us. View quote
Julian Barnes
Books say: She did this because. Life says: She did this. Books are where things are explained to you; life is where things aren't. I'm not surprised some people prefer books. View quote
Julian Barnes
This was another of our fears: that Life wouldn't turn out to be like Literature. View quote
Julian Barnes
What you end up remembering isn't always the same as what you have witnessed. View quote
Julian Barnes
Nature is so exact, it hurts exactly as much as it is worth, so in a way one relishes the pain, I think. If it didn't matter, it wouldn't matter. View quote
Julian Barnes
One of the troubles is this: the heart isn't heart-shaped. (Julian Barnes)
It's easy, after all, not to be a writer. Most people aren't writers, and very little harm comes to them. View quote
Julian Barnes
Now, Stuart, as you will discover if you have not done so already, believes that the principal raison d'etre of food is to conceal from public view the hideous pattern on the plate beneath. View quote
Julian Barnes
Remember the botched brothel-visit in L'Education sentimentale and remember its lesson. Do not participate: happiness lies in the imagination, not the act. Pleasure is found first in anticipation, later in memory. View quote
Julian Barnes
Sometimes I think the purpose of life is to reconcile us to its eventual loss by wearing us down, by proving, however long it takes, that life isn't all it's cracked up to be. View quote
Julian Barnes
The greatest patriotism is to tell your country when it is behaving dishonorably, foolishly, viciously. View quote
Julian Barnes
Because love is the meeting point of truth and magic. Truth, as in photography; magic, as in ballooning. View quote
Julian Barnes
This is what those who haven't crossed the tropic of grief often fail to understand: the fact that someone is dead may mean that they are not alive, but doesn't mean that they do not exist. View quote
Julian Barnes
The writer must be universal in sympathy and an outcast by nature: only then can he see clearly. View quote
Julian Barnes
Love may not lead where we think or hope, but regardless of outcome it should be a call to seriousness and truth. If it is not that - if it is not moral in its effect - then love is no more than an exaggerated form of pleasure. View quote
Julian Barnes
You put together two things that have not been put together before. And the world is changed... (Julian Barnes)
Most of us remember adolescence as a kind of double negative: no longer allowed to be children, we are not yet capable of being adults. View quote
Julian Barnes
Grief seems at first to destroy not just all patterns, but also to destroy a belief that a pattern exists. View quote
Julian Barnes
Reading and life are not separate but symbiotic. And for this serious task of imaginative discovery and self-discovery, there is and remains one perfect symbol: the printed book. View quote
Julian Barnes
The more you learn, the less you fear. "Learn" not in the sense of academic study, but in the practical understanding of life. View quote
Julian Barnes