Quotes from Justine

“Does not everything depend on our interpretation of the silence around us?”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“There are only three things to be done with a woman. You can love her, suffer for her, or turn her into literature.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“A city becomes a world when one loves one of its inhabitants.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“We are all hunting for rational reasons for believing in the absurd.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“Who invented the human heart, I wonder? Tell me, and then show me the place where he was hanged.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“I am quite alone. I am neither happy nor unhappy; I lie suspended like a hair or a feather in the cloudy mixtures of memory.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“These are the moments which are not calculable, and cannot be assessed in words; they live on in the solution of memory, like wonderful creatures, unique of their own kind, dredged up from the floors of some unexplored ocean.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“إنه لأمر فظيع أن يلوم الإنسان نفسه فوق ما يُعانيه من شقاء وعذاب.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“She took kisses like so many coats of paint […] how long and how vainly I searched for excuses which might make her amorality if not palatable at lest understandable. I realize now the time I wasted in this way; instead of enjoying her and turning aside from these preoccupations with the thought, ‘She is untrustworthy as she is beautiful. She takes love as plants do water, lightly, thoughtlessly.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“Art—the meaning of the pattern of our common actions in reality. The cloth-of-gold that hides behind the sackcloth of reality, forced out by the pain of human memory.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“The loved object is simply one that has shared an experience at the same moment of time, narcissistically; and the desire to be near the beloved object is at first not due to the idea of possessing it, but simply to let the two experiences compare themselves, like reflections in different mirrors. All this may precede the first look, kiss, or touch; precede ambition, pride, or envy; precede the first declarations which mark the turning point—for from here love degenerates into habit, possession, and back to loneliness.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“I have been thinking about the girl I met last night in the mirror: dark on the marble-ivory white: glossy black hair: deep suspiring eyes in which one's glances sink because they are nervous, curious, turned to sexual curiosity.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“I suppose the secret of his success is in his tremendous idleness which almost approaches the supernatural.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“I have done so many things in my life," she said to the mirror. "Evil things, perhaps. But never unattentively, never wastefully...was I wrong?”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“It is hard to fight with one's heart's desires; whatever it wishes to get, it purchases at the cost of the soul.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“In these days Melissa's absorbed and provoking gentleness had all the qualities of a rediscovered youth. Her long uncertain fingers - I used to feel them moving over my face when she thought I slept, as if to memorize the happiness we had shared. In her there was a pliancy, a resilience which was Oriental - a passion to serve. My shabby clothes - the way she picked up a dirty shirt seemed to engulf it with an overflowing solicitude; in the morning I found my razor beautifully cleaned and even the toothpaste laid upon the brush in readiness. Her care for me was a goad, provoking me to give my life some sort of shape and style that might match the simplicity of hers. Of her experiences in love she would never speak, turning from them with a weariness and distaste which suggested that they had been born of necessity rather than desire. She paid me the comlpiment of saying: "For the first time I am not afraid to be light-headed or foolish with a man".”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“الكراهية ما هى إلا حب لم يتحقق.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“People only see in us the contemptible skirt-fever which rules our actions but completely miss the beauty-hunger underlying it.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“What do you believe? You never say anything. At the most you sometimes laugh.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“إننا نستخدم بعضنا البعض كمعاول نهدم بها هؤلاء الذين نحبهم حبا حقيقيا.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“He thought and suffered a good deal but he lacked the resolution to dare--the first requisite of a practitioner.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“أسوأ فشل عانيته هو فشلى مع الناس: ولقد كان ذلك نتاج انفصال روحى أخذ يزداد بالتدريج، انفصال نهائى عن التملك بينما أطلق لى العنان كى أتعاطف مع الناس. وغدوت شيئا فشيئا وعلى نحو لا يمكن تفسيره أشد عجزا عن ممارسة الحب.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“Poverty is a great cutter-off and riches a great shutter-off.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“مظهره الخارجى لم يحمل أى إشارة تنبئ عن هذه الصراعات، فقد ظل حديثه جافا موزونا رغم حمى الأفكار التى تكمن وراءه.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“إن المرء يحتاج لقدر هائل من الجهل حتى يقرب الله، وأعتقد أننى كنت أعرف على الدوام أكثر مما يجب.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“For us artists there waits the joyous compromise through art with all that wounded or defeated us in daily life; in this way, not to evade destiny, as do the ordinary people, but to fulfill it in its true potential - the imagination.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“الحب ليس إلا نوعا من اللغة التى يتحدث بها الجسد.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“He hablado de la inutilidad del arte, pero no he dicho la verdad sobre el consuelo que procura.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

“Her efforts to achieve herself had led her always towards, and not away from him.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

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Popular quotes

“Se levanta y hace la cama, luego recoge del suelo unos libros de bolsillo (novelas policíacas) y los pone en la librería. Tiene ropa que lavar antes de irse, ropa que guardar, medias que emparejar y meter en los cajones. Envuelve la basura en papel de periódico y baja tres pisos para dejarla en el cubo de la basura. Saca los calcetines de Cal de detrás de la cama y los sacude, dejándolos sobre la mesa de la cocina. Hay trapos que lavar, hollín en el alféizar de las ventanas, cacerolas en remojo por fregar, hay que poner un plato bajo el radiador por si funciona durante la semana (se sale). Oh. Aj. Que se queden las ventanas como están, aunque a Cal no le gusta verlas sucias. Esa espantosa tarea de restregar el retrete, pasarle el plumero a los muebles. Ropa para planchar. Siempre se caen cosas cuando recoges otras. Se agacha una y otra vez. La harina y el azúcar se derraman sobre los estantes que hay encima de la pila y tiene que pasar un paño; hay manchas y salpicaduras, hojas de rábano podridas, incrustaciones de hielo dentro de la vieja nevera (hay que mantener la puerta abierta con una silla, para que se descongele). Pedazos de papel, caramelos, cigarrillos y ceniza por toda la habitación. Tiene que quitarle el polvo a todo. Decide limpiar las ventanas a pesar de todo, porque quedan más bonitas. Estarán asquerosas después de una semana. Por supuesto, nadie la ayuda. Nada tiene la altura adecuada. Añade los calcetines de Cal a la ropa de ambos que tiene que llevar a la lavandería de autoservicio, hace un montón separado con la ropa de él que tiene que coser, y pone la mesa para sí misma. Raspa los restos de comida del plato del gato, y le pone agua limpia y leche. «Mr. Frosty» no parece andar por allí. Debajo de la pila encuentra un paño de cocina, lo recoge y lo cuelga sobre la pila, se recuerda a sí misma que tiene que limpiar allí abajo más tarde, y se sirve cereales, té, tostadas y zumo de naranja. (El zumo de naranja es un paquete del gobierno de naranja y pomelo en polvo y sabe a demonios.) Se levanta de un salto para buscar la fregona debajo de la pila, y el cubo, que también debe estar por allí. Es hora de fregar el suelo del cuarto de baño y el cuadrado de linóleo que hay delante de la pila y la cocina. Primero termina el té, deja la mitad del zumo de naranja y pomelo (haciendo una mueca) y algo del cereal. La leche vuelve a la nevera —no, espera un momento, tírala—, se sienta un minuto a escribir una lista de comestibles para comprarlos en el camino del autobús a casa, cuando vuelva dentro de una semana. Llena el cubo, encuentra el jabón, lo deja, friega sólo con agua. Lo guarda todo. Lava los platos del desayuno. Coge una novela policíaca y la hojea, sentada en el sofá. Se levanta, limpia la mesa, recoge la sal que ha caído en la alfombra y la barre. ¿Eso es todo? No, hay que arreglar la ropa de Cal y la suya. Oh, déjalo. Tiene que hacer la maleta y preparar la comida de Cal y la suya (aunque él no se marcha con ella). Eso significa volver a sacar las cosas de la nevera y volver a limpiar la mesa, dejar pisadas en el linóleo otra vez. Bueno, no importa. Lava el plato y el cuchillo. Ya está. Decide ir por la caja de costura para arreglar la ropa de él, cambia de opinión. Coge la novela policíaca. Cal dirá: «No has cosido mi ropa.» Va a coger la caja de costura del fondo del armario, pisando maletas, cajas, la tabla de plancha, su abrigo y ropa de invierno. Pequeñas manos salen de la espalda de Jeannine y recogen lo que ella tira. Se sienta en el sofá y arregla el desgarrón de la chaqueta de verano de él, cortando el hilo con los dientes. Vas a estropearte el esmalte. Botones. Zurce tres calcetines. (Los otros están bien.) Se frota los riñones. Cose el forro de una falda que está descosido. Limpia zapatos. Hace una pausa y mira sin ver. Luego reacciona y con aire de extraordinaria energía saca la maleta mediana del armario y empieza a meter su ropa para”
― Joanna Russ, quote from The Female Man

“Taking a lifetime to grow up.”
― quote from Not Quite What I Was Planning: Six-Word Memoirs by Writers Famous and Obscure

“The richest fuckin' people in the richest country in the world - you gonna tell them some little guy in a hole in South America can have something they can't? Like shit, man. If the little guy in the hole can be a revolutionary, they can be revolutionaries too.”
― Robert Stone, quote from Dog Soldiers

“I went around the house to the back door thinking, I have been to a dance and a boy has walked me home and kissed me. It was all true. My life was possible.”
― Alice Munro, quote from Dance of the Happy Shades

“Don’t you wear glasses, George?” “Not anymore. I had my eyes lasered.” Can you say midlife crisis? Radial keratotomy is the new red Porsche.”
― Lisa Scottoline, quote from Dirty Blonde

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