John Fowles Quotes

Quotes about:

• The most important questions in life can never be answered by anyone except oneself.

  John Fowles

  Life, Philosophy, Important

  John Fowles (1968). “The Magus”, Pan

  57 Copy quote

• The profoundest distances are never geographical.

  John Fowles

  Distance

  John Fowles (1965). “The Magus”

  40 Copy quote

• There are only two races on this planet - the intelligent and the stupid.

  John Fowles

  Stupid, Silly, Intelligent

  "Daily Telegraph", August 15, 1991.

  33 Copy quote

• One degrades oneself sometimes in the effort not to be lonely.

  John Fowles

  Lonely, Effort, Sometimes

  2003 After a late night socializing. In The Journals: Volume1, 24 Dec 1950.

  7 Copy quote

• Adulthood is not an age, but a stage of knowledge of self.

  John Fowles

  Self, Age, Adulthood

  8 Copy quote

• Being an atheist is a matter not of moral choice, but of human obligation.

  John Fowles

  Atheist, Choices, Atheism

  John Fowles (2010). “Wormholes”, p.28, Random House

  4 Copy quote

• That was the tragedy. Not that one man had the courage to be evil. But that millions had not the courage to be good.

  John Fowles

  Men, Evil, Tragedy

  John Fowles (1968). “The Magus”, Pan

  8 Copy quote

• One of the great fallacies of our time is that the Nazis rose to power because they imposed order on chaos. Precisely the opposite is true - they were successful because they imposed chaos on order. They tore up the commandments, they denied the super-ego, what you will. They said, "You may persecute the minority, you may kill, you may torture, you may couple and breed without love." They offered humanity all its great temptations. Nothing is true, everything is permitted.

  John Fowles

  Love, Time, Couple

  John Fowles (1968). “The Magus”, Pan

  33 Copy quote

• There comes a time in each life like a point of fulcrum. At that time you must accept yourself. It is not any more what you will become. It is what you are and always will be.

  John Fowles

  Life, Philosophy, Acceptance

  John Fowles (1968). “The Magus”, Pan

  24 Copy quote

• We all want things we can't have. Being a decent human being is accepting that.

  John Fowles

  Want, Accepting, Decent

  John Fowles (1980). “The collector”, Dell Pub Co

  9 Copy quote

• There are many reasons why novelists write, but they all have one thing in common - a need to create an alternative world.

  John Fowles

  Writing, Novelists, Needs

  20 Copy quote

• I am infinitely strange to myself.

  John Fowles

  Strange

  JOHN FOWLES (1969). “THE FRENCH LIEUTENANT'S WOMAN”

  15 Copy quote

• Men love war because it allows them to look serious. Because it is the one thing that stops women laughing at them.

  John Fowles

  Love, War, Men

  John Fowles (1968). “The Magus”, Pan

  17 Copy quote

• Time is not a road - it is a room.

  John Fowles

  Time, Rooms

  22 Copy quote

• Another reason I think the novel will survive is that the reader has to work in a novel. In a film, you are presented with someone else's imagination exactly bodied out. The marvelous thing about a novel is that every reader will imagine even the very simplest sentence slightly differently.

  John Fowles

  Thinking, Imagination, Empathy

  21 Copy quote

• The price of tapping water into every house is that no one values water any more.

  John Fowles

  Water, House, Tapping

  John Fowles (1970). “The Aristos”, Signet Book

  4 Copy quote

• Always we try to put the wild in a cage.

  John Fowles

  Trying, Cages, Environment

  John Fowles (2010). “Wormholes”, p.316, Random House

  14 Copy quote

• There is only one good definition of God: the freedom that allows other freedoms to exist.

  John Fowles

  God, Definitions

  JOHN FOWLES (1969). “THE FRENCH LIEUTENANT'S WOMAN”

  6 Copy quote

• We chase the reward, we get the reward and then we discover that the true reward is always the next reward. Buying pleasure is a false end.

  John Fowles

  Rewards, Buying, Next

  John Fowles (1970). “The Aristos”, Signet Book

  4 Copy quote

• I think we are just insects, we live a bit and then die and that’s the lot. There’s no mercy in things. There’s not even a Great Beyond. There’s nothing.

  John Fowles

  Thinking, Mercy, Insects

  John Fowles (1980). “The collector”, Dell Pub Co

  16 Copy quote

• We all write poems; it is simply that poets are the ones who write in words.

  John Fowles

  Writing, Reading Poetry, Poetry

  1969 The French Lieutenant's Woman, ch.19.

  11 Copy quote

• The noblest relationship is marriage, that is, love. Its nobility resides in its altruism, the desire to serve another beyond all the pleasures of the relationship; and in its refusal ever to regard the other as a thing, an object, a utilizability. Sex is an exchange of pleasures, of needs; love is a giving without return. It is this giving without return, this helping without reward, this surplus of pure good, that identifies the uniqueness of man as well as the true nature of the true marriage. This is the quintessence the great alchemy of sex is for.

  John Fowles

  Love, Sex, Men

  16 Copy quote

• Liking other people is an illusion we have to cherish in ourselves if we are to live in society.

  John Fowles

  People, Cherish, Illusion

  John Fowles (1968). “The Magus”, Pan

  4 Copy quote

• Love is the mystery between two people, not the identity.

  John Fowles

  Love Is, Two, People

  John Fowles (1965). “The Magus”

  4 Copy quote

• Alive. Alive in the way that death is alive.

  John Fowles

  Alive, Way

  John Fowles (2010). “The Collector”, p.118, Random House

  19 Copy quote

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