Quotes from The Unconsoled

Kazuo Ishiguro ·  535 pages

Rating: (7.8K votes)


“Silence is just as likely to indicate the most profound ideas forming, the deepest energies being summoned.”
― Kazuo Ishiguro, quote from The Unconsoled


“Your wound, your silly little wound! That's your real love, Leo, that wound, the one true love of your life! I know how it will be, even if we tried, even if we managed to build something all over again. The music too, that would be no different. Even if they'd accepted you tonight, even if you became celebrated in this town, you'd destroy it all, you'd destroy everything, pull it all down around you just as you did before. And all because of that wound. Me, the music, we're neither of us anything more to you than mistresses
you seek consolation from. You'll always go back to your one real love. To that wound! And you know what makes me so angry? Leo, are you listening to me? Your wound, it's nothing special, nothing special at all. In this town alone, I know there are many people with far worse. And yet they carry on, every one of them, with far greater courage than you ever did. They go on with their lives. They become something worthwhile. But you, Leo, look at you. Always tending your wound.”
― Kazuo Ishiguro, quote from The Unconsoled


“I have this feeling, that all it will take will be one moment, even a tiny moment, provided it’s the correct one. Like a cord suddenly snapping and a thick curtain dropping to the floor to reveal a whole new world, a world full of sunlight and warmth.”
― Kazuo Ishiguro, quote from The Unconsoled


“It had occurred to me to follow her through into the next room, visitors or no visitors, and bring her back for a talk. But in the end I had decided in favour of waiting where I was for her return. Sure enough, a few minutes later, Sophie had come back into the room, but something in her manner had prevented me from speaking and she had gone out again. In fact, although during the following half-hour Sophie had entered and left the room several more times, for all my resolve to make my feelings known to her, I had returned to my newspaper with a strong sense of hurt and frustration.”
― Kazuo Ishiguro, quote from The Unconsoled


“Left alone, I must quickly have drifted off into my own thoughts, for I did not notice the barman return. He must have done so, however, for I was soon drinking coffee, staring at the mirrored wall behind the bar - in which I could see not only my own reflection but much of the room behind me. After a while, for some reason, i found myself replaying in my head key moments from a football match I had attended many years earlier - an encounter between Germany and Holland. I adjusted my posture on the high-stool - I could see I was hunching excessively - and tried recalling the names of the players in the Dutch team that year. Rep, Krol, Haan, Neeskens. After several minutes I had succeeded in remembering all but two of the players, but these last two names remained just beyond the rim of my recall. As I tried to remember, the sound of the fountain behind me, which at first I had found quite soothing, began to annoy me. It seemed that if only it woulds stop, my memory would unlock and I would finally remember the names.”
― Kazuo Ishiguro, quote from The Unconsoled



“One should not, in any case, attempt to make a virtue out of one's limitations.”
― Kazuo Ishiguro, quote from The Unconsoled


“It's nonsense to believe people go on loving each other regardless of what happens.”
― Kazuo Ishiguro, quote from The Unconsoled


About the author

Kazuo Ishiguro
Born place: in Nagasaki, Japan
Born date November 8, 1954
See more on GoodReads

Popular quotes

“(There is a saying among women scientists who attend highly specialized engineering universities, where the girl-to-guy ratio is decidedly in their favor: “The odds are good, but the goods are odd.”)”
― Michio Kaku, quote from The Future of the Mind: The Scientific Quest to Understand, Enhance, and Empower the Mind


“Well, of course it was Billy screwing with his mind. That's what Billy did. Dear Old Dad had a PhD in mind screwing. The question was, was it just Billy screwing with his mind?”
― Barry Lyga, quote from Game


“After all the years, after everything that you'd had to endure, after everything that you'd undertaken, however good or bad, long after you'd given up all hope, the reward.”
― Marlene van Niekerk, quote from Agaat


“EVERYONE SAYS THAT GETTING over somebody ‘just takes time’ and that one day it will stop hurting and the door will open for you to move on. We are also told that love is eternal; something extraordinary that will stay with you forever.”
― Natasha Preston, quote from Broken Silence


“But everyone knows you need fireworks to make independence official.”
― John Scalzi, quote from Fuzzy Nation


Interesting books

The Summer of Katya
(2.7K)
The Summer of Katya
by Trevanian
First Meetings in Ender's Universe
(11K)
First Meetings in En...
by Orson Scott Card
Last Words
(10.2K)
Last Words
by George Carlin
The Great Fires
(1.9K)
The Great Fires
by Jack Gilbert
When You Were Mine
(4.4K)
When You Were Mine
by Rebecca Serle
Cards on the Table
(25.2K)
Cards on the Table
by Agatha Christie

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.