Quotes from A Week in Winter

Maeve Binchy ·  464 pages

Rating: (35.4K votes)


“How will I explain it all … to everybody?” “You know, people don’t have to explain things nearly as much as you think they do.”
― Maeve Binchy, quote from A Week in Winter


“It’s a funny old world. Once you realize that, you’re halfway there.”
― Maeve Binchy, quote from A Week in Winter


“Her life was like her house—a colorful fantasy where anything was possible if you wanted it badly enough.”
― Maeve Binchy, quote from A Week in Winter


“a piper from the area called John Paul. Of course he did. Everyone knew”
― Maeve Binchy, quote from A Week in Winter


“Winnie’s silver-and-black jacket might be too dressy. She wore a”
― Maeve Binchy, quote from A Week in Winter



About the author

Maeve Binchy
Born place: in Dalkey, County Dublin, Ireland
Born date May 28, 1940
See more on GoodReads

Popular quotes

“Speaking of novels,’ I said, ‘you remember we decided once, you, your husband and I, that Proust’s rough masterpiece was a huge, ghoulish fairy tale, an asparagus dream, totally unconnected with any possible people in any historical France, a sexual travestissement and a colossal farce, the vocabulary of genius and its poetry, but no more, impossibly rude hostesses, please let me speak, and even ruder guests, mechanical Dostoevskian rows and Tolstoian nuances of snobbishness repeated and expanded to an unsufferable length, adorable seascapes, melting avenues, no, do not interrupt me, light and shade effects rivaling those of the greatest English poets, a flora of metaphors, described—by Cocteau, I think—as “a mirage of suspended gardens,” and, I have not yet finished, an absurd, rubber-and-wire romance between a blond young blackguard (the fictitious Marcel), and an improbable jeune fille who has a pasted-on bosom, Vronski’s (and Lyovin’s) thick neck, and a cupid’s buttocks for cheeks; but—and now let me finish sweetly—we were wrong, Sybil, we were wrong in denying our little beau ténébreux the capacity of evoking “human interest”: it is there, it is there—maybe a rather eighteenth-centuryish, or even seventeenth-centuryish, brand, but it is there. Please, dip or redip, spider, into this book [offering it], you will find a pretty marker in it bought in France, I want John to keep it. Au revoir, Sybil, I must go now. I think my telephone is ringing.”
― Vladimir Nabokov, quote from Pale Fire


“I am always amazed by people who know something is wrong but still insist on ignoring it, as if that will somehow make it go away. They spare themselves the confrontation, but end up boiling in resentment anyway.”
― David Levithan, quote from Every Day


“To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from Macbeth


“Seldom, very seldom, does complete truth belong to any human disclosure; seldom can it happen that something is not a little disguised or a little mistaken.”
― Jane Austen, quote from Emma


“Horace was big for his age and a natural athlete. The chances that he would be refused were virtually nonexistent. Horace was exactly the type of recruit that Sir Rodney looked for in his warrior apprentices. Strong, athletic, fit. And, thought Will a trifle sourly, not too bright.”
― John Flanagan, quote from The Ruins of Gorlan


Interesting books

Here on Earth
(41.3K)
Here on Earth
by Alice Hoffman
In the Lake of the Woods
(14.4K)
In the Lake of the W...
by Tim O'Brien
The Girls
(18.7K)
The Girls
by Lori Lansens
City of Saints and Madmen
(4.4K)
City of Saints and M...
by Jeff VanderMeer
The Day of Battle: The War in Sicily and Italy, 1943-1944
(9.8K)
The Day of Battle: T...
by Rick Atkinson
Second Treatise of Government
(16.4K)
Second Treatise of G...
by John Locke

About BookQuoters

BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.

We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.

Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.