Quotes from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“Reality denied comes back to haunt.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“To live is to be haunted.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“Grief causes you to leave yourself. You step outside your narrow little pelt. And you can’t feel grief unless you’ve had love before it - grief is the final outcome of love, because it’s love lost. […] It’s the cycle of love completed: to love, to lose, to feel grief, to leave, and then to love again. Grief is the awareness that you will have to be alone, and there is nothing beyond that because being alone is the ultimate final destiny of each individual living creature. That’s what death is, the great loneliness.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“Fear can make you do more wrong than hate or jealousy. If you’re afraid you don’t commit yourself to life completely; fear makes you always, always hold something back. You shouldn’t be alone. It’s killing you; it’s undermining you. All the time, every day, you should be somewhere with people.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“Why is love so good...? You love someone and they leave. They come home one day and you say "What's happening?" and they say, "I got a better offer someplace else," and there they go, out of your life forever, and after that until you're dead you're carrying around this huge hunk of love with no one to give it to. And if you do find someone to give it to, the same thing happens all over.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“Why does a man cry? he wondered. Not like a woman; not for that. Not for sentiment. A man cries over the loss of something, something alive. A man can cry over a sick animal that he knows won't make it. The death of a child: a man can cry for that. But not because things are sad.
A man, he thought, cries not for the future or the past but for the present.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“Because her general taste appalled him, it annoyed him that he himself constituted one of her favorites. It was an anomaly which he had never been able to take apart.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“Whatever you fear will happen to you, booze will make it happen.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“Love isn't just wanting another person the way you want to own an object you see in a store. That's just desire. You want to have it around, take it home and set it up somewhere in the apartment like a lamp.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“No rational response was possible. Her irrationality made it so. The terrible power, he thought, of illogic.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“Ruth said, "Love isn't just wanting another person the way you want to own an object you see in a store. That's just desire. You want to have it around, take it home and set it up somewhere in the apartment like a lamp. Love is"-she paused, reflecting-"like a father saving his children from a burning house, getting them out and denying himself. When you love you cease to live for yourself; you live for another person.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“Nobody named Cheerful Charley is tuned in on my wavelength”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“He felt the pressure of her love as she squeezed his fingers, and then there was nothing. Except the pain. But nothing else, no Heather, no hospital, no staff men, no light. And no sound. It was an eternal moment and it absorbed him completely.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“Ruth said, "Love isn't just wanting another person the way you want to own an object you see in a store. That's just desire. You want to have it around, take it home and set it up somewhere in the apartment like a lamp. Love is"-she paused, reflecting-"like a father saving his children from a burning house, getting them out and dying himself. When you love you cease to live for yourself; you live for another person.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“Fear,” Jason said, “can make you do more wrong than hate or jealousy. If you’re afraid you don’t commit yourself to life completely; fear makes you always, always hold something back.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“She sighed. "Oh, God, to be in the flyship cruising through the void. That's what I long for: an infinite void. With no human voices, no human smells, no human jaws masticating plastic chewing gum in nine iridescent colors.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“This kind of neighborhood did not please him; he had seen it a million times, duplicated throughout the face of the earth. It had been from such as this that he had fled, early in his life, to use his sixness as a method of getting out. And now he had come back.

He did not object to the people: he saw them as trapped here, the ordinaries, who through no fault of their own had to remain. They had not invented it; they did not like it; they endured it, as he had not had to. In fact, he felt guilty, seeing their grim faces, their turned-down mouths. Jagged, unhappy mouths.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“Grief causes you to leave yourself. You step outside your narrow little pelt. And you can’t feel grief unless you’ve had love before it – grief is the final outcome of love, because it’s love lost. You do understand; I know you do. But you just don’t want to think about it. It’s the cycle of love completed: to love, to lose, to feel grief, to leave, and then to love again. Jason, grief is awareness that you will have to be alone, and there is nothing beyond that because being alone is the ultimate final destiny of each individual living creature. That’s what death is, the great loneliness.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“You never see the ones who really love you and help you; you're always involved with strangers.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“Am I being paid back for something I did? he asked himself. Something I don't know about or remember? But nobody pays back, he reflected. I learned that a long time ago: you're not paid back for the bad you do nor the good you do. It all comes out uneven at the end. Haven't I learned that by now, if I've learned anything?”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“You shouldn't be frightened so easily. Or life is going to be too much for you.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“But look at the aspirations of that rabbit and look at his failing. A little life trying. And all the time it was hopeless. But the rabbit didn't know that. Or maybe did know and kept trying anyhow. But I think he didn't understand. He just wanted to do it so badly. It was his whole life, because he loved the cats.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“Spegnetevi, vane luci, più non brillate!
Non v'è notte nera a sufficienza per chi,
In preda alla disperazione, piange la persa fortuna.
La luce altro non fa che svelare la vergogna.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

“Certa gente perde una creatura amata e tira dritto e sposta il proprio affetto su un'altra. Ma è doloroso. Troppo doloroso. L'amore supera l'istinto. Quando ami smetti di vivere per te stesso. Vivi per un'altra persona. La sofferenza è l'emozione più forte che un uomo o un bambino o un animale possano provare. E' una buona sensazione. La sofferenza ti spinge a lasciare te stesso. Esci dal tuo piccolo e limitato guscio. E non puoi soffrire se prima non hai amato. La sofferenza è l'esito finale dell'amore, perché è amore perduto. È il completamento del ciclo dell'amore: amare, perdere, soffrire, lasciare e lasciarsi, poi amare di nuovo. Soffrire è la consapevolezza che dovrai essere solo, e al di là di questo non c'è nulla, perché essere solo è il destino ultimo, definitivo di ogni creatura vivente. Ecco cos'è la morte: la grande solitudine. La conoscenza della mancanza di coscienza. Quando moriremo non ce ne accorgeremo, perché morire è perdere tutto quanto. Ma soffrire è morire ed essere vivi allo stesso tempo. L'esperienza più assoluta, più totale che si possa provare. È troppo. Il corpo arriva quasi a distruggersi, con tutti quei sussulti, quelle contorsioni. Ma io voglio provare dolore. Versare lacrime. La sofferenza ti unisce di nuovo a ciò che hai perso. E' una fusione. Te ne vai anche tu con la cosa o la persona amata che scompare. In un certo senso, ti dividi da te stesso e l'accompagni, fai con lei una parte del viaggio. La segui sin dove ti è concesso spingerti. Ma alla fine, la sofferenza se ne a e tu torni in sintonia con il mondo. Senza l'altro. E riesci ad accettarlo. Che altra scelta abbiamo? Piangi, continui a piangere, perché non torni mai del tutto indietro dal posto in cui sei andato con l'altro. Un frammento che si è staccato dal tuo cuore pulsante è ancora là. C'è una lesione. Una ferita che non guarisce mai. E se ti succede una volta e un'altra e un'altra volta ancora, col tempo se ne va una parte troppo grande del tuo cuore e non riesci più a soffrire. E allora tu stesso sei pronto a morire. Salirai la scala in diagonale e qualcun altro resterà indietro a soffrire per te.”
― Philip K. Dick, quote from Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

About the author

Popular quotes

“Make me remember what it feels like to be loved.”
― A.L. Jackson, quote from When We Collide

“Cause you piss me off. You make me laugh. You make me think. You’re absolutely fine with me bein’ nothin’ but me. You’re fuckin’ gorgeous. You’re a great lay. And you like my dog.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from Kaleidoscope

“I know this from the hollow sound that persists after the men’s prayer, and from their faces pressed against the window of supplication. And from their coloring, the complexion of people who respond to fear of the absurd with zeal. As for me, I don’t like anything that rises to heaven, I only like things affected by gravity. I’ll go so far as to say I abhor religions. All of them! Because they falsify the weight of the world. Sometimes I feel like busting through the wall that separates me from my neighbor, grabbing him by the throat, and yelling at him to quit reciting his sniveling prayers, accept the world, open his eyes to his own strength, his own dignity, and stop running after a father who has absconded to heaven and is never coming back. Have a look at that group passing by, over there. Notice the little girl with the veil on her head, even though she’s not old enough to know what a body is, or what desire is. What can you do with such people? Eh?”
― Kamel Daoud, quote from The Meursault Investigation

“Too revved to sleep."

"Is that so?" Some of the light she loved was back in his eyes. "Well, what can we do to pass the time, help you relax? Cribbage, perhaps?"

Her eyes narrowed. "Cribbage? Is that some perverted sexual activity?"

He laughed, and grabbing her, tossed her onto the bed. "Why not?”
― J.D. Robb, quote from Portrait in Death

“Look, nobody's trying to kill me right now and that's just fine. If they don't
like me, that's just how it goes. I got over needing people to LIKE me in tenth
grade, when I spied the captain of the cheerleading squad on her knees in
front of the offensive line of the football team under the bleachers, one day after school. I figured that wasn't the life for me.”
― MaryJanice Davidson, quote from Undead and Unpopular

Interesting books

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.