Site uses cookies to provide basic functionality.

OK
1 2 ▲ ▼
Link Quote Stars Tags Author
325a29f It is amazing how complete is the delusion that beauty is goodness. delusion goodness lies self-deception wisdom Leo Tolstoy
58ee22e "All right," said Susan. "I'm not stupid. You're saying humans need... to make life bearable." REALLY? AS IF IT WAS SOME KIND OF PINK PILL? NO. HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE. "Tooth fairies? Hogfathers? Little--" YES. AS PRACTICE. YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LIES. "So we can believe the big ones?" YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING. "They're not the same at all!" YOU THINK SO? THEN TAKE THE UNIVERSE AND GRIND IT DOWN TO THE FINEST POWDER AND SIEVE IT THROUGH THE FINEST SIEVE AND THEN ME ONE ATOM OF JUSTICE, ONE MOLECULE OF MERCY. AND YET--Death waved a hand. AND YET YOU ACT AS IF THERE IS SOME IDEAL ORDER IN THE WORLD, AS IF THERE IS SOME...SOME IN THE UNIVERSE BY WHICH IT MAY BE JUDGED. "Yes, but people have to believe that, or what's the --" MY POINT EXACTLY." justice lies mercy truth Terry Pratchett
48d77b3 Anything is better than lies and deceit! honesty lies lying Leo Tolstoy
e3fb27f "Ronan said, "I'm always straight." Adam replied "Oh, man, that's the biggest lie you've ever told." lies love Maggie Stiefvater
0f611b9 Oh, what a tangled web we weave...when first we practice to deceive. honesty inspirational lies truth deception Walter Scott
51dc133 Nothing is ever certain. cruel death lies phrases sad truth Alice Sebold
d9372cd Anyone who believes what a cat tells him deserves all he gets. lies Neil Gaiman
c087b9d "Why aren't you in school? I see you every day wandering around." "Oh, they don't miss me," she said. "I'm antisocial, they say. I don't mix. It's so strange. I'm very social indeed. It all depends on what you mean by social, doesn't it? Social to me means talking to you about things like this." She rattled some chestnuts that had fallen off the tree in the front yard. "Or talking about how strange the world is. Being with people is nice. But I don't think it's social to get a bunch of people together and then not let them talk, do you? An hour of TV class, an hour of basketball or baseball or running, another hour of transcription history or painting pictures, and more sports, but do you know, we never ask questions, or at least most don't; they just run the answers at you, bing, bing, bing, and us sitting there for four more hours of film-teacher. That's not social to me at all. It's a lot of funnels and lot of water poured down the spout and out the bottom, and them telling us it's wine when it's not. They run us so ragged by the end of the day we can't do anything but go to bed or head for a Fun Park to bully people around, break windowpanes in the Window Smasher place or wreck cars in the Car Wrecker place with the big steel ball. Or go out in the cars and race on the streets, trying to see how close you can get to lampposts, playing 'chicken' and 'knock hubcaps.' I guess I'm everything they say I am, all right. I haven't any friends. That's supposed to prove I'm abnormal. But everyone I know is either shouting or dancing around like wild or beating up one another. Do you notice how people hurt each other nowadays?" antisocial bullying conform hurt lies loneliness peer-pressure school social society wandering Ray Bradbury
7366e43 It [feminism] is mixed up with a muddled idea that women are free when they serve their employers but slaves when they help their husbands. femininism inspirational lies G.K. Chesterton
30cedb2 Better to get hurt by the truth than comforted with a lie. lies truth Khaled Hosseini
c11f92a We're all islands shouting lies to each other across seas of misunderstanding. isolation lies loneliness misunderstanding Rudyard Kipling
f70a586 When it comes to controlling human beings there is no better instrument than lies. Because, you see, humans live by beliefs. And beliefs can be manipulated. The power to manipulate beliefs is the only thing that counts. lies power Michael Ende
f6d725a We met less than a week ago and in that time I've done nothing but lie and cheat and betray you. I know. But if you give me a chance...all I want is to protect you. To be near you. For as long as I'm able. chances friendship intstalove-done-right lies love lunar-chronicles protection scarlet wolf Marissa Meyer
b8aafa2 The truth is messy. It's raw and uncomfortable. You can't blame people for preferring lies. lies truth Holly Black
10cbf48 Lies are neither bad nor good. Like a fire they can either keep you warm or burn you to death, depending on how they're used. falsity lies max-brooks truth world-war-z Max Brooks
d8736d4 ...even a tiny bit of deceit is dishonorable when it's used for selfish or cowardly reasons inspirational lies lying truth Jeanne Birdsall
a1f36cc "I never lie," I said offhand. "At least not to those I don't love." deciet hate interview-with-the-vampire lestat lie lies love lovers lying secret secrets truth vampire vampires Anne Rice
319ba8b We're going to have to let truth scream louder to our souls than the lies that have infected us. lies Beth Moore
60ad2ea In the library I felt better, words you could trust and look at till you understood them, they couldn't change half way through a sentence like people, so it was easier to spot a lie. library lies people reading words Jeanette Winterson
9b37290 I told him I was going to betray you, and betray Lyra, and he believed me because I was corrupt and full of wickedness; he looked so deep I felt sure he'd see the truth. But I lied too well. I was lying with every nerve and fiber and everything I'd ever done...I wanted him to find no good in me, and he didn't. There is none. good lies love mrs-coulter truth Philip Pullman
8e402be To those who abuse: the sin is yours, the crime is yours, and the shame is yours. To those who protect the perpetrators: blaming the victims only masks the evil within, making you as guilty as those who abuse. Stand up for the innocent or go down with the rest. abuse abusers innocent inspirational lies perpetrators poetry survivors victims Flora Jessop
5e675c8 People trust their eyes above all else - but most people see what they wish to see, or what they believe they should see; not what is really there deception inspirational lies truth Zoë Marriott
e2af455 The Devil hath power To assume a pleasing shape. hamlet lies male-beauty William Shakespeare
54dd08d Was it necessary to tell me that you wanted nothing in the world but me?' The corners of his mouth drooped peevishly. Oh, my dear, it's rather hard to take quite literally the things a man says when he's in love with you.' Didn't you mean them?' At the moment. honesty lies love men relationships women W. Somerset Maugham
6e305ce You are beautiful. Know this. Anyone who tells you otherwise is simply lying. You are beautiful. beauty inspirational lies self-love Steve Maraboli
b3a302e "In this treacherous world Nothing is the truth nor a lie. evil good lies perception truth Pedro Calderón de la Barca
124627b We wait and think and doubt and hate. How does it make you feel? The overwhelming feeling is rage. We hate ourself for being unable to be other than what we are. Unable to be better. We feel rage. The feelings must be followed. It doesn't matter whether you're an ideologue or a sensualist, you follow the stimuli thinking that they're your signposts to the promised land. But they are nothing of the kind. What they are is rocks to navigate the past, each on your brush against, ripping you a little more open and they are always more on the horizon. But you can't face up to the that, so you force yourself to believe the bullshit of those you instinctively know are liars and you repeat those lies to yourself and to others, hoping that by repeating them often and fervently enough you'll attain the godlike status we accord those who tell the lies most frequently and most passionately. But you never do, and even if you could, you wouldn't value it, you'd realise that nobody believes in heroes any more. We know that they only want to sell us something we don't really want and keep from us what we really do need. Maybe that's a good thing. Maybe we're getting in touch with our condition at last. It's horrible how we always die alone, but no worse than living alone. lies life schizophrenia truth Irvine Welsh
a6e2246 A harp can be a dangerous as a sword, in the right hands. harp lies song-lyrics sword truths George R.R. Martin
b323994 [P]erhaps you notice how the denial is so often the preface to the justification. justification lies torture Christopher Hitchens
c65f432 You know there's no such thing as a complete lie. There's always some truth in there. honesty lies truth David Levithan
88cf4fb Cathy's lies were never innocent. Their purpose was to escape punishment, or work, or responsibility, and they were used for profit. Most liars are tripped up either because they forget what they have told or because the lie is suddenly faced with an incontrovertible truth. But Cathy did not forget her lies, and she developed the most effective method of lying. She stayed close enough to the truth so that one could never be sure. She knew two other methods also -- either to interlard her lies with truth or to tell a truth as though it were a lie. If one is accused of a lie and it turns out to be the truth, there is a backlog that will last a long time and protect a number of untruths. liars lies lying John Steinbeck
6b728e3 The armour of falsehood is subtly wrought out of darkness, and hides a man not only from others, but from his own soul. integrity lies E.M. Forster
e5f1d76 If we could believe that he [Jesus] really countenanced the follies, the falsehoods, and the charlatanism which his biographers [Gospels] father on him, and admit the misconstructions, interpolations, and theorizations of the fathers of the early, and the fanatics of the latter ages, the conclusion would be irresistible by every sound mind that he was an impostor... We find in the writings of his biographers matter of two distinct descriptions. First, a groundwork of vulgar ignorance, of things impossible, of superstitions, fanaticisms and fabrications... That sect [Jews] had presented for the object of their worship, a being of terrific character, cruel, vindictive, capricious and unjust... Jesus had to walk on the perilous confines of reason and religion: and a step to right or left might place him within the gripe of the priests of the superstition, a blood thirsty race, as cruel and remorseless as the being whom they represented as the family God of Abraham, of Isaac and of Jacob, and the local God of Israel. They were constantly laying snares, too, to entangle him in the web of the law... That Jesus did not mean to impose himself on mankind as the son of God, physically speaking, I have been convinced by the writings of men more learned than myself in that lore. [Letter to William Short, 4 August, 1820] fake freethinker freethought god-of-abraham imposter jehovah judaism lies new-testament reason skeptic skepticism yahweh Thomas Jefferson
9c999c3 Lies 1: There is only the present and nothing to remember. Lies 2: Time is a straight line. Lies 3: The difference between the past and the future is that one has happened while the other has not. Lies 4: We can only be in one place at a time. Lies 5: Any proposition that contains the word 'finite' (the world, the universe, experience, ourselves...) Lies 6: Reality as something which can be agreed upon. Lies 7: Reality is truth. lies past reality time truth untruths Jeanette Winterson
fd7d253 There are different ways to be confused about how someone's disappointed you. Some lie about the future because they wanted to forget the past. But some will lie about the past because they think it will give you both a future. lies love Laura Dave
14dc8ef It was hard to live normally when you were constantly pretending you didn't see what was going on in front of your face. lady-midnight lies life love the-dark-artifices truth Cassandra Clare
acd8134 Hope will lie to you, but lust is what it is; it never lies. lies lust Laurell K. Hamilton
8ca309c I've always resented the smug statements of politicians, media commentators, corporate executives who talked of how, in America, if you worked hard you would become rich. The meaning of that was if you were poor it was because you hadn't worked hard enough. I knew this was a lie, about my father and millions of others, men and women who worked harder than anyone, harder than financiers and politicians, harder than anybody if you accept that when you work at an unpleasant job that makes it very hard work indeed. falsity-of-the-american-dream hard-work indignation-of-the-poor lies victim-blaming Howard Zinn
f4c5e5d Lips and tongues lie. But actions never do. No matter what words are spoken, actions betray the truth of everyone's heart. actions-speak-louder-than-words lies truth Sherrilyn Kenyon
02cf449 "When to people tell the same lie..." "They are working together," Will finished" james jem lies will Cassandra Clare
462b1d8 If what he said was the truth, it broke her heart. If what he said was a lie, it was broken anyway. heart lies truth Christine Feehan
f5066aa Sometimes what I wouldn't give to have us sitting in a bar again at 9:00 a.m. telling lies to one another, far from God. god lies Denis Johnson
4c05d63 It's lies. It's all lies. Some of them are just prettier than others, that's all. People see what they think is there. despair lies realism reality Terry Pratchett
cb3ece5 Resistance is always lying and always full of shit. lies lying resistance shit Steven Pressfield
130453d One must lie under certain circumstances and at all times when one can't do anything about them. lies Harper Lee
cb44413 But he that sows lies in the end shall not lack of a harvest, and soon he may rest from toil indeed, while others reap and sow in his stead. liars lies melkor J.R.R. Tolkien
ae8e80e He drew the dagger and laid it on the table between them; a length of dragonbone and Valyrian steel, as sharp as the difference between right and wrong, between true and false, between life and death. lies life truth George R.R. Martin
87a1804 Sarcasm is when you tell someone the truth by lying on purpose. humor lies lying sarcasm truth Chuck Klosterman
89e9617 "Holly clambered after him, struggling up the human-size steps. "Wait! Just wait," she called, overtaking Artemis and looking him in the eye from one step up. "I know you, Artemis. You like to play your genius card close to your chest until the big reveal. And that's worked out for us so far. But this time you need to let me in. I can help. So, tell me the truth, do you have a plan?" Artemis met his friend's gaze and lied to her face. "No," he said. "No plan." holly lies Eoin Colfer
e0d1485 "YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES. "So we can believe the big ones?" YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING." lies mercy Terry Pratchett
4be091f You and your sister are very dear to each other. To show your regard, you give each other lovely bouquets of lies. lies love Holly Black
54e3449 I know, brother, that you are a straightforward man, and that you pride yourself on it. But put one question to yourself: in fact should one tell the truth? What obliges us to do it? And why do we consider telling the truth a virtue? Imagine that you meet a madman, who claims that he is a fish and that we are all fish. Are you going to argue with him? Are you going to undress in front of him and show him that you don't have fins? Are you going to say to his face what you think? Well, tell me!' His brother was silent and Edward went on: 'If you told him the whole truth and nothing but the truth, only what you really thought, you would enter into a serious conversation with a madman and you yourself would become mad. And it is the same way with the world that surrounds us. If I obstinately told a man the truth to his face, it would mean I was taking him seriously. And to take something so unimportant seriously means to become less than serious oneself. I, you see, lie, if I don't want to take madmen seriously and become one of them myself. lies lying truth virtue Milan Kundera
17cb684 "Anyway, why would you trust anything written down? She certainly didn't trust "Mothers of Borogravia!" and that was from the government. And if you couldn't trust the government, who could you trust? Very nearly everyone, come to think of it..." humor lies propaganda war Terry Pratchett
d55443c This, the language of deception, we both understand. We were born to it, along with the curses. lies life truth Holly Black
10f49b9 Sometimes, one wants to have the illusion that one is making ones own life, out of one's own resources. lies life resources work Zadie Smith
403dc95 It's exhausting, the energy it takes to unknow a truth. honesty lie lies truth Chuck Palahniuk
f799560 Don't tell me anymore. You should have your dream, as the old woman told you to. I understand how you feel, but if you put those feelings into words they will turn into lies. (from Thailand) feelings lies Haruki Murakami
5c47124 "How do I know you're not crazy?" she asks. "How do I know you're not the craziest dude I've ever met?" "You'll have to test me out." "You have my info," she says. "I'll think about it." "Rain," I say. "That's not your real name." "Does it matter?" "Well, it makes me wonder what else isn't real." "That's because you're a writer," she says. "That's because you make things up for a living." "And?" "And"-- she shrugs--"I've noticed that writers tend to worry about things like that." lies reality sanity socializing truth writing Bret Easton Ellis
3e86697 That's the myth of it, the required lie that allows us to render our judgments. Parasites, criminals, dope fiends, dope peddlers, whores--when we can ride past them at Fayette and Monroe, car doors locked, our field of vision cautiously restricted to the road ahead, then the long journey into darkness is underway. Pale-skinned hillbillies and hard-faced yos, toothless white trash and gold-front gangsters--when we can glide on and feel only fear, we're well on the way. And if, after a time, we can glimpse the spectacle of the corner and manage nothing beyond loathing and contempt, then we've arrived at last at that naked place where a man finally sees the sense in stretching razor wire and building barracks and directing cattle cars into the compound. It's a reckoning of another kind, perhaps, and one that becomes a possibility only through the arrogance and certainty that so easily accompanies a well-planned and well-tended life. We know ourselves, we believe in ourselves; from what we value most, we grant ourselves the illusion that it's not chance in circumstance, that opportunity itself isn't the defining issue. We want the high ground; we want our own worth to be acknowledged. Morality, intelligence, values--we want those things measured and counted. We want it to be about Us. Yes, if we were down there, if we were the damned of the American cities, we would not fail. We would rise above the corner. And when we tell ourselves such things, we unthinkably assume that we would be consigned to places like Fayette Street fully equipped, with all the graces and disciplines, talents and training that we now posses. Our parents would still be our parents, our teachers still our teachers, our broker still our broker. Amid the stench of so much defeat and despair, we would kick fate in the teeth and claim our deserved victory. We would escape to live the life we were supposed to live, the life we are living now. We would be saved, and as it always is in matters of salvation, we know this as a matter of perfect, pristine faith. Why? The truth is plain: We were not born to be niggers. delusion fear hatred lies poverty prejudice race society the-american-dream David Simon
8588424 But the truth is that no person ever understands another, from beginning to end of life, there is no truth that can be known, only the story we imagine to be true, the story they really believe to be true about themselves; and all of them lies. lies stories the-truth Orson Scott Card
4ae2523 Deception is mostly a game we play with ourselves. lies life truth Terry Brooks
0f8d15c But knowledge does not protect one. Life is contemptuous of knowledge; it forces it to sit in the anterooms, to wait outside. Passion, energy, lies: these are what life admires. lies life passion James Salter
806cdc0 And now, Elric had told three lies. The first concerned his cousin Yyrkoon. The second concerned the Black Sword. The third concerned Cymoril. And upon those three lies was Elric's destiny to be built, for it is only about things which concern us most profoundly that we lie clearly and with profound conviction. cymoril destiny elric-of-melnibone eternal-champion lies yyrkoon Michael Moorcock
f8a5db4 It's not enough to be able to lie with a straight face; anybody with enough gall to raise on a busted flush can do that. The first way to lie artistically is to tell the truth -- but not all of it. The second way involves telling the truth, too, but is harder: Tell the exact truth and maybe all of it...but tell it so unconvincingly that your listener is sure you are lying. half-truths lies lying omissions truth Robert A. Heinlein
acc76eb Once you take to the habit of deception, every new lie comes that much easier. Though to me it wasn't so much lies as a matter of judicious editing. We all inevitably present a version of ourselves that is a collection of half-truths and exclusions. The way I saw it, the truth was too complicated, whereas the well-chosen lie would put everyone's mind at ease. half-truths lies lying public-image Caroline Kettlewell
0a21afb "A DEAD STATESMAN I could not dig: I dared not rob: Therefore I lied to please the mob. Now all my lies are proved untrue And I must face the men I slew. What tale shall serve me here among deceit dishonesty irony lies politics truth war youth Rudyard Kipling
2bb7d18 Within every elaborate lie, a kernel of truth. honesty lie lies lying stories truth Marisha Pessl
0de7791 No one can tell the difference between a clone and a human. That's because there isn't any difference. The idea of clones being inferior is a filthy lie. humanity inferiority lies Nancy Farmer
899bfcb "You know I love you. You're the only one." "She isn't the first woman he's ever said that to. He shouldn't have used it up so much earlier in his life, he shouldn't have treated it like a tool, a wedge, a key to open women. By the time he got around to meaning it, the words sounded fraudulent to him and he'd been ashamed to pronounce them." lies love manipulation Margaret Atwood
21a9ddc America's intellectual community has never been very bright. Or honest. They're all sheep, following whatever the intellectual fashion of the decade happens to be. Demanding that everyone follow their dicta in lockstep. Everyone has to be open-minded and tolerant of the things they believe, but God forbid they should ever concede, even for a moment, that someone who disagrees with them might have some fingerhold of truth. lies lockstep patterns truth Orson Scott Card
9a1b6de Thus the feeling I sometimes have - which all of us who work closely with aphasiacs have - that one cannot lie to an aphasiac. He cannot grasp your words, and cannot be deceived by them; but what he grasps he grasps with infallible precision, namely the expression that goes with the words, the total, spontaneous, involuntary expressiveness which can never be simulated or faked, as words alone can, too easily. grasping ideas lies understanding Oliver Sacks
db6832d Telling Sam and Daneca feels like peeling off my own skin to expose everything underneath. It hurts. conspiracies hidden lies secrets sharing-secrets truth Holly Black
a913409 What you don't know won't hurt you. A dubious maxim: sometimes what you don't know can hurt you very much. ignorance knowledge learning lies loss pain philosophy philosophy-of-life Margaret Atwood
6617f06 Arraigned at my own bar, Memory having given her evidence of the hopes, wishes, sentiments I had been cherishing since last night-- of the general state of mind which I have indulged for nearly a fortnight past; Reason having come forward and told in her own quiet way , a plain, unvarnished tale, showing how I had rejected the real, and rabidly devoured the ideal;-- I pronounced judgment to this effect:-- That a greater fool than Jane Eyre had never breathed the breath of life: that a more fantastic idiot had never surfeited herself on sweet lies, and swallowed the poison as if it were nectar. lies Charlotte Brontë
383be0b No forgiveness for lies. lies Ryū Murakami
1b03bfe It appeared clear to me - partly because of the lies that filled my history textbooks - that the intent of formal education was to inculcate obedience to a social order that did not deserve my loyalty. Defiance seemed the only dignified response to the adult world. edcuation history inculcating lies loyalty obediance social-order textbooks Timothy B. Tyson
cd75d0c There's a tipping point with lies, a point where you've said something so many times that it feels truer than the truth. lies lying Holly Black
305de68 I wonder why people you have to meet have to be such liars. They lie as if their lives depended on it. lies Ryū Murakami
71b9dab ...fairy tales, just a fancy word for lies... fancy lies romance Cecelia Ahern
f0cb4b4 I am smiling a big adopted-orphan smile as I write this ... I still love scribbling the word - WRITER - any time on a form, questionnaire, document asks for my occupation. Fine, I write personality quizzes, I don't write about the Great Issues of the Day, but I think it's fair to say I am a writer ... ('Adopted-orphan smile', I mean, that's not bad, come on.) compulsive-lying crazy-bitch ego egotistical fantasy liar lie lies out-of-touch-with-reality pretending reality self-righteous smile smiling superiority-complex vain vainity wannabe wannabewriter writer writing Gillian Flynn
b798f19 I'm very gullible when it comes to my own words. I believe everything I say, though I know I am a liar. inspirational lies reality truth words Roger Zelazny
c75fe9e "What do you have to forget or overlook in order to desire that this dysfunctional clan once more occupies the White House and is again in a position to rent the Lincoln Bedroom to campaign donors and to employ the Oval Office as a massage parlor? You have to be able to forget, first, what happened to those who complained, or who told the truth, last time. It's often said, by people trying to show how grown-up and unshocked they are, that all Clinton did to get himself impeached was lie about sex. That's not really true. What he actually lied about, in the perjury that also got him , was the bill-clinton corruption feminism gennifer-flowers hillary-clinton juanita-broaddrick kathleen-willey lies lincoln-bedroom monica-lewinsky oval-office perjury politics rape sex sleaze smear-campaign united-states united-states-elections-2008 white-house Christopher Hitchens
5ddcba5 "Not for a moment did he consider keeping a journal. He would never allow anyone to read his private thoughts; therefore, he did not risk writing them down. "I'd rather take it to my grave," he said. And anyway, when was a journal ever honest? "It either tells a lot of truths to cover a single lie, " he said, "or a lot of lies to cover a single truth." lies private-thoughts truth Michael Finkel
b6fab28 The young gentlemen who came calling seemed especially puzzling. They sat in their velvet shirts and their leather boots, nibbling burnt cakes and praising Diamond's mind, and all the while their eyes said other things. their eyes said. Then: 'You are flowers,' their mouths said, 'You are jewels, you are golden dreams.' Their eyes said: lies love the-lion-and-the-lark Patricia A. McKillip
7f4d1eb Lies cannot nourish or protect you. Only freedom from fear, freedom from lies, can make us beautiful, and keep us safe. beauty fear freedom lies safe safety Anne Lamott
8cf4713 Very soon she'll join all the others who know the secret and will not tell it. Or cannot. Or try and fail because they do not know enough. They can be recognized. White faces, dazed eyes, aimless gestures, high-pitched laughter. The way they walk and talk and scream or try to kill (themselves or you) if you laugh back at them. Yes, they've got to be watched. For the time comes when they try to kill, then disappear. But others are waiting to take their places, it's a long, long line. She's one of them. I too can wait--for the day when she is only a memory to be avoided, locked away, and like all memories a legend. Or a lie ... lies memories Jean Rhys
0d2ece0 Many things in this period have been hard to bear, or hard to take seriously. My own profession went into a protracted swoon during the Reagan-Bush-Thatcher decade, and shows scant sign of recovering a critical faculty--or indeed any faculty whatever, unless it is one of induced enthusiasm for a plausible consensus President. (We shall see whether it counts as progress for the same parrots to learn a new word.) And my own cohort, the left, shared in the general dispiriting move towards apolitical, atonal postmodernism. Regarding something magnificent, like the long-overdue and still endangered South African revolution (a jagged fit in the supposedly smooth pattern of axiomatic progress), one could see that Ariadne's thread had a robust reddish tinge, and that potential citizens had not all deconstructed themselves into Xhosa, Zulu, Cape Coloured or 'Eurocentric'; had in other words resisted the sectarian lesson that the masters of apartheid tried to teach them. Elsewhere, though, it seemed all at once as if competitive solipsism was the signifier of the 'radical'; a stress on the salience not even of the individual, but of the trait, and from that atomization into the lump of the category. Surely one thing to be learned from the lapsed totalitarian system was the unwholesome relationship between the cult of the masses and the adoration of the supreme personality. Yet introspective voyaging seemed to coexist with dull group-think wherever one peered about among the formerly 'committed'. Traditionally then, or tediously as some will think, I saw no reason to discard the Orwellian standard in considering modern literature. While a sort of etiolation, tricked out as playfulness, had its way among the non-judgemental, much good work was still done by those who weighed words as if they meant what they said. Some authors, indeed, stood by their works as if they had composed them in solitude and out of conviction. Of these, an encouraging number spoke for the ironic against the literal mind; for the generously interpreted interest of all against the renewal of what Orwell termed the 'smelly little orthodoxies'--tribe and Faith, monotheist and polytheist, being most conspicuous among these new/old disfigurements. In the course of making a film about the decaffeinated hedonism of modern Los Angeles, I visited the house where Thomas Mann, in another time of torment, wrote . My German friends were filling the streets of Munich and Berlin to combat the recrudescence of the same old shit as I read: The path to this concept of enlightenment is not to be found in the pursuit of self-pity, or of self-love. Of course to be merely a political animal is to miss Mann's point; while, as ever, to be an apolitical animal is to leave fellow-citizens at the mercy of Ideolo'. For the sake of argument, then, one must never let a euphemism or a false consolation pass uncontested. The truth seldom lies, but when it does lie it lies somewhere in between. apoliticism argument atheism berlin bought-priesthood cape-coloureds cold-war communism conviction critical-thinking enlightenment euphemism eurocentricism faith film george-hw-bush george-orwell german-people germany groupthink hedonism humanism individualism irony journalism left-wing-politics lies literary-criticism literature los-angeles margaret-thatcher monotheism munich orthodoxy personality-politics politics polytheism populism postmodernism potus progress radical-politics religion right-wing-politics ronald-reagan russia science sectarianism self-love self-pity socialism solipsism south-africa soviet-union thomas-mann totalitarianism tribalism truth united-states xhosa-people zulu-people Christopher Hitchens
4345f4a But men love abstract reasoning and neat systematization so much that they think nothing of distorting the truth, closing their eyes and ears to contrary evidence to preserve their logical constructions. lies logic systemization Fyodor Dostoyevsky
dbd92e5 You know I hate, detest, and can't bear a lie, not because I am straighter than the rest of us, but simply because it appals me. There is a taint of death, a flavour of mortality in lies -which is exactly what I hate and detest in the world -what I want to forget. It makes me miserable and sick, like biting something rotten would do. Temperament, I suppose. lies temperament Joseph Conrad Fehr
4a40209 You're such a great liar when you lie to yourself. liar lies Rebecca McNutt
29519b0 Belief in the lie is the life of the lie. lies truth Ursula K. Le Guin
ca1b6e6 the false innocence you render for them by censoring truth protects only you falsehood lies Laurie Halse Anderson
4b52a02 I looked at her. Sheila was my girl--the girl I wanted--and wanted for keeps. But it wasn't any use having illusions about her. Sheila was a liar and probably always would be a liar. It was her way of fighting for survival--the quick easy glib denial. It was a child's weapon--and she'd probably never got out of using it. If I wanted Sheila, I must accept her as she was--be at hand to prop up the weak places. We've all got our weak places. Mine were different from Sheila's, but they were there. lies love mistakes weakness Agatha Christie
9ec9af3 "Politics bores you?" Bronsen said. Julien smiled. "It does. Apologies, sir, and it is not that I haven't tried to be fascinated. But careful and meticulous research has suggested the hypothesis that all politicians are liars, fools, and tricksters, and I have as yet come across no evidence to the contrary. They can do great damage, and rarely any good. It is the job of the sensible man to try and protect civilization from their depradations." damage deceit depradation lies politicians politics scholarship Iain Pears
b0f2db3 The truth will set us free. But freedom is cold and empty and frightening, and lies can often be warm and beautiful. lies truth George R.R. Martin
36b54c2 Let every writer tell his own lies That's freedom of the press. freedom-of-the-press lies lying news the-news truth Norman Mailer
70a0f46 The whole fabric of our religion is based on superstitious belief in lies that have been foisted upon us for ages by those directly above us, to whose personal profit and aggrandizement it was to have us continue to believe as they wished us to believe. lies profit scam superstition Edgar Rice Burroughs
7f98e46 People with red hair are supposed to get mad very easily,...,and he had very red hair. lies red-hair J.D. Salinger
e35069a She walked away without bothering to look further. She knew he'd be fine. Her specialty was subduing without causing any real damage. He'd lie there for a few minutes. He'd be sore, maybe bruised tomorrow. He'd brush the cobwebs off his imagination to invent a story for his buddies about how three seven-foot, three-hundred-pound male karate black belts attacked him in the park. But she would bet her life on the fact that he would never sneak up on another fragile-looking woman without remembering this night. And that was the point. That was what Gaia lived for. fragile lessons lies subdue Francine Pascal
8b6694e I looked at Mum and realized -- -- that she was telling an untruth. A untruth. And I remember thinking in that instant how thrilling and grown-up it must be to say something so untrue, as opposed to the little amateur fibs I was already practiced at -- horrid little apprentice sinner that I was --like the ones about you'd already said your prayers or washed under the fingernails. Yes, I was . I too must learn to say these gorgeous untruths. Imaginary kings and queens would be houseguests when I was older. lies mendacity Christopher Buckley
9357f23 Sociopaths are attracted to politics because the see it as a sphere in which you can be ruthless and step all over people. That fact that some politicians can tell such awful lies is another example of sociopathy. Sociopaths lie--they see nothing wrong with it. liars lies politicians politics sociopaths sociopathy Alexander McCall Smith
7e4e665 You can tell yourself that you would be willing to lose everything you have in order to get something you want. But it's a catch-22: all of those things that you're willing to lose are what make you recognizable. Lose them, and you've lost yourself. identity lies lose sacrifice Jodi Picoult
d0fa1c8 She suddenly remembered studying the brain in science class- how a steel rod pierced a man's skull, and he opened his mouth to speak Portuguese, a language he'd never studied. Maybe it would be like this, now, for Josie. Maybe her native tongue, from here on in, would be a string of lies. lies mouth native-tongue remembered speak string Jodi Picoult
6bcd822 "Seeing the name in a headline last week--a headline about a life that had involved real achievement--I felt a mouse stirring in the attic of my memory. Eventually, I was able to recall how the two Hillarys had once been mentionable in the same breath. On a first-lady goodwill tour of Asia in April 1995--the kind of banal trip that she now claims as part of her foreign-policy 'experience'--Mrs. Clinton had been in Nepal and been briefly introduced to the late Sir Edmund Hillary, conqueror of Mount Everest. Ever ready to milk the moment, she announced that her mother had actually named her for this famous and intrepid explorer. The claim 'worked' well enough to be repeated at other stops and even showed up in Bill Clinton's memoirs almost a decade later, as one more instance of the gutsy tradition that undergirds the junior senator from New York. Sen. Clinton was born in 1947, and Sir Edmund Hillary and his partner Tenzing Norgay did not ascend Mount Everest until 1953, so the story was self-evidently untrue and eventually . Indeed, a spokeswoman for Sen. Clinton named Jennifer Hanley phrased it like this in a statement in October 2006, conceding that the tale was untrue but nonetheless charming: 'It was a sweet family story her mother shared to inspire greatness in her daughter, to great results I might add.' 1953 1995 2006 2008 asia bill-clinton celebrity edmund-hillary first-lady first-lady-of-the-united-states foreign-policy hillary-clinton jennifer-hanley lies mount-everest nepal new-york politics tenzing-norgay united-states united-states-elections-2008 united-states-senate Christopher Hitchens
becc919 I'm right and wrong, moral and immoral, good and bad, a hero and a villain, and I've been just as capable of truth as I have been lies. bad chasing-impossible good good-and-bad hero hero-and-villain immoral katie-mcgarry lies moral moral-and-immoral pushing-the-limits right right-and-wrong truth truth-and-lies villain wrong Katie McGarry
b3811ee That, as my cousin Nord would say, is where my improvised lie falls apart. lies Eoin Colfer
a7e20e7 Writers of fiction embellish reality almost without knowing it. lies lying writers writing Aljean Harmetz
d17af1e The prevarication and white lies which a mind that keeps itself ambitiously pure is as uneasy under as a great artist under the false touches that no eye detects but his own, are worn as lightly as mere trimming when once the actions have become a lie. lie lies pure George Eliot
881b1c8 As for her, I'd forgotten her for the moment. So I shall never understand why, suddenly, bewilderingly, I was certain that everything I had imagined to be truth was false. False. Only the magic and the dream are true--all the rest's a lie. Let it go. Here is the secret. Here. lies magic secrets truth Jean Rhys
984c8f8 During the 1992 election I concluded as early as my first visit to New Hampshire that Bill Clinton was hateful in his behavior to women, pathological as a liar, and deeply suspect when it came to money in politics. I have never had to take any of that back, whereas if you look up what most of my profession was then writing about the beefy, unscrupulous 'New Democrat,' you will be astonished at the quantity of sheer saccharine and drool. Anyway, I kept on about it even after most Republicans had consulted the opinion polls and decided it was a losing proposition, and if you look up the transcript of the eventual Senate trial of the president--only the second impeachment hearing in American history--you will see that the last order of business is a request (voted down) by the Senate majority leader to call Carol and me as witnesses. So I can dare to say that at least I saw it through. bill-clinton carol-blue chauvinism corruption democratic-party-us elections history impeachment impeachment-of-bill-clinton lies misogyny money new-democrats new-hampshire pathology politics presidents republican-party-us sexism trials united-states us-presidential-election-1992 us-presidents us-senate women Christopher Hitchens
b20838b "The meaning of life in western secular society is to be successful. So many people are success mad and they are encouraged to reach for something and have so called "worthwhile goals". Money, fame, power, good looks, possessions are the indicators of success and the media and advertising companies exploit this. People are conditioned to believe that they can only feel happy or good about themselves if they have these things. This of course is not true." companies conditioned conditioning deceit fame goals good happiness indicators is lies life looks meaning media money of possessions power secular society success successful truth western what Tim Crawshaw
944c547 You people don't know what the truth is! It's there, just under the bullshit, but you never look! That's what I hate most about this fucking city-- Lies are news and truth is obsolete! lies news obsolete spider-jerusalem truth Warren Ellis
444fb2c The first rule in life is 'everybody lies.' Remember that and you'll get a lot further. cynical lies life lying rule rules Jennifer Crusie
7db9867 "Yet isn't it all--all of it, every single episode and detail of the Clinton saga--exactly like that? And isn't some of it a little bit more serious? For Sen. Clinton, something is true if it validates the myth of her striving and her 'greatness' (her overweening ambition in other words) and only ceases to be true when it no longer serves that limitless purpose. And we are all supposed to applaud the skill and the bare-faced bravado with which this is done. In the New Hampshire primary in 1992, she knowingly lied about her husband's uncontainable sex life and put him eternally in her debt. This is now thought of, and referred to in print, purely as a smart move on her part. In the Iowa caucuses of 2008, he returns the favor by telling a huge lie about his own record on the war in Iraq, falsely asserting that he was opposed to the intervention from the very start. This is thought of, and referred to in print, as purely a tactical mistake on his part: trying too hard to help the spouse. The happy couple has now united on an equally 2008 ambition bill-clinton expediency greatness hillary-clinton iowa iowa-caucuses iraq iraq-war lies new-hampshire new-hampshire-primary politics self-promotion sex united-states united-states-elections-2008 Christopher Hitchens
d328d39 A lie is no less a lie because it is a thousand years old. Your undivided church has liked nothing better than persecuting its own members, burning them and hacking them apart when they stood by their own conscience, slashing their bellies open and feeding their guts to dogs. lies revisionist-history Hilary Mantel
835a77b But the lie had to be a good one, because if your lie is badly done it makes everyone feel wretched, liar and lied-to alike plunged into the deepest lackadaisy, and everyone just feels like going into the other room and drinking a glass of water, or whatever is available there, whereas if you can lie really well then get dynamite results, 35 percent report increased intellectual understanding, awareness, insight, 40 percent report more tolerance, acceptance of others, liking for self, 29 percent report they receive more personal and more confidential information from people and that others become more warm and supportive toward them--all in consequence of a finely orchestrated, carefully developed untruth. lies untruths Donald Barthelme
c511c04 Those were some astounding lies, cub. And the very last one the most inspired of all. You have your father's talent for it. cub fitz fool lies love nighteyes Robin Hobb
d32af8a "Dr. Louis Jolyon "Jolly" West was born in New York City on October 6, 1924. He died of cancer on January 2, 1999. Dr. West served in the U.S. Army during World War II and received his M.D. from the University of Minnesota in 1948, prior to Air Force LSD and MKULTRA contracts carried out there. He did his psychiatry residency from 1949 to 1952 at Cornell (an MKULTRA Institution and site of the MKULTRA cutout The Human Ecology Foundation). From 1948 to 1956 he was Chief, Psychiatry Service, 3700th USAF Hospital, Lackland Air Force Base, San Antonio, Texas Psychiatrist-in-Chief, University of Oklahoma Consultant in Psychiatry, Oklahoma City Veterans Administration Hospital Consultant in Psychiatry. [...] Dr. West was co-editor of a book entitled Hallucinations, Behavior, Experience, and Theory[285]. One of the contributors to this book, Theodore Sarbin, Ph.D., is a member of the Scientific and Professional Advisory Board of the False Memory Syndrome Foundation (FMSF). Other members of the FMSF Board include Dr. Martin Orne, Dr. Margaret Singer, Dr. Richard Ofshe, Dr. Paul McHugh, Dr. David Dinges, Dr. Harold Lief, Emily Carota Orne, and Dr. Michael Persinger. The connections of these individuals to the mind control network are analyzed in this and the next two chapters. Dr. Sarbin[272] (see Ross, 1997) believes that multiple personality disorder is almost always a therapist-created artifact and does not exist as a naturally-occurring disorder, a view adhered to by Dr. McHugh[188], [189], Dr. Ofshe[213] and other members of the FMSF Board[191], [243]. Dr. Ofshe is a colleague and co-author of Dr. Singer[214], who is in turn a colleague and co author of Dr. West[329]. Denial of the reality of multiple personality by these doctors in the mind control network, who are also on the FMSF Scientific and Professional Advisory Board, could be disinformation. The disinformation could be amplified by attacks on specialists in multiple personality as CIA conspiracy lunatics[3], [79], [191], [213]. The FMSF is the only organization in the world that has attacked the reality of multiple personality in an organized, systematic fashion. FMSF Professional and Advisory Board Members publish most of the articles and letters to editors of psychiatry journals hostile to multiple personality disorder." child-abuse cia denial dissociative-identity-disorder ethics false-memory-syndrome-foundation fmsf government-abuse lies military-abuse misinformation mkultra multiple-personality-disorder ritual-abuse Colin A. Ross
5c859f9 Brendan knew about the truth. In most cases, it was just a matter of deciding whether you wanted to look it in the face or live with the comfort of ignorance and lies. And ignorance and lies were often underrated. Most people Brendan knew couldn't make it through the day without a saucerful of ignorance and a side of lies. lies truth Dennis Lehane
962cbc4 Above all, avoid lying, especially lying to yourself. Keep watching out for your lies, watch for them every hour, every minute. Also avoid disgust, both for others and yourself: whatever strikes you as disgusting within yourself is cleansed by the mere fact that you notice it. Avoid fear, too, although fear is really only a consequence of lies. Never be afraid of your petty selfishness when you try to achieve love and don't be too alarmed if you act badly on occasion. disgust fear lies love lying self-love selfishness Fyodor Dostoyevsky
fa0651d And somewhere out there, in the river of addicts, alcoholics, wife beaters, doormats, overeducated legalized thieves, fascist police, and bitter rivalries-- someone told me it's a good city, and I don't know what's more frightening ignorance-is-bliss lies life small-towns society Volatalistic Phil
691a933 What is the nature of the border between truth and lies? It is permeable and blurred because it is planted thick with rumour, confabulation, misunderstandings and twisted tales. Truth can break the gates down, truth can howl in the street; unless truth is pleasing, personable and easy to like, she is condemned to stay whimpering at the back door. hilary-mantel lies truth Hilary Mantel
fcbbbbd "It was after a Frontline television documentary screened in the US in 1995 that the Freyds' public profile as aggrieved parents provoked another rupture within the Freyd family, when William Freyd made public his own discomfort. 'Peter Freyd is my brother, Pamela Freyd is both my stepsister and sister-in-law,' he explained. Peter and Pamela had grown up together as step-siblings. 'There is no doubt in my mind that there was severe abuse in the home of Peter and Pam, while they were raising their daughters,' he wrote. He challenged Peter Freyd's claims that he had been misunderstood, that he merely had a 'ribald' sense of humour. 'Those of us who had to endure it, remember it as abusive at best and viciously sadistic at worst.' He added that, in his view, 'The False memory Syndrome Foundation is designed to deny a reality that Peter and Pam have spent most of their lives trying to escape.' He felt that there is no such thing as a false memory syndrome.' Criticising the media for its uncritical embrace of the Freyds' campaign, he cautioned: bias biased child-abuse child-rape child-sexual-abuse denial deny enabling-abuse fabrication false-memory false-memory-syndrome-foundation flawed fmsf freyd incest influence jennifer-freyd lies media objective paedophile pamela-freyd pedophile peter-freyd protecting-pedophiles psychology reality sadistic sex-abuse siblings story surprise truth underwager Judith Jones Beatrix Campbell
94726f0 They want to see their expectation... Entertainment has nothing to do reality. Entertainment is antithetical to reality. lies media Michael Crichton
2d3ba45 "You know all of the young gentlemen better than I do," Lady Manston continued. "Are there any we should avoid?" All of them, George wanted to say. ''What about Ashbourne's son?'' "No." "No?" his mother echoed. "No, as in you don't have an opinion?" "No, as in no. He is not for Billie." Who, George could not help but note, was watching the mother-son exchange with an odd mix of curiosity and alarm. "Any particular reason?" Lady Manston asked. "He gambles," George lied. Well, maybe it wasn't a lie. All gentlemen gambled. He had no idea if the one in question did so to excess. "What about the Billington heir? I think he --" "Also no." His mother regarded him with an impassive expression. "He's too young," George said, hoping it was true. "He is?" She frowned. "I suppose he might be. I can't remember precisely." jealousy lies love marriage men Julia Quinn
dc77a97 I believe his lies, so he believes mine.' She turns and looks at me straight on. 'That's how it goes at the end of love. lies love relationships Paul Murray
1f3a496 Your husband certainly love money,' she said. 'That is no lie Money have pretty face for everybody, but for that man money pretty like pretty self, he can't see nothing else. lies money rochester Jean Rhys
b0a43ed The truth, he thought, has never been of any real value to any human being- it is a symbol for mathematicians and philosophers to pursue. I human relations kindness and lies are worth a thousand truths. lies mathematics philosophy truth Graham Greene
43aed35 You know,' she begins, 'you fellas ought to be looking after each other.' Her comment makes me realise that through the lies, the greatest irony is that we are looking out for each other. It's just that in the end, we're letting her down. That's what injures us. irony letting-her-down lies looking-after-each-other Markus Zusak
6b6435f Mitch's take on humanity had deteriorated to the point where he assumed someone was lying if her lips were moving. cynical humanity lies lips lying Jennifer Crusie
7d70fe1 Do you think I lie to you? No. But you think I might lie to you about dying. Yes. Okay. I might. But we're not dying. Okay. lies life Cormac McCarthy
8a5b186 Mostly, it is lies that will destroy a relationship. Deceit is a barrier to intimacy. Andre Chevalier intimacy lies pretending relationships Nikki Sex
b5870fe Honesty can force any dysfunction in your life to the surface. Are you in an abusive relationship? A refusal to lie to others - How did you get that bruise? - would oblige you to come to grips with this situation very quickly. Do you have a problem with drugs or alcohol? Lying is the lifeblood of addiction. If we have no recourse to lies, our lives can unravel only so far without others noticing. Telling the truth can also reveal ways in which we want to grow but haven't. growth honesty integrity lies lying mental-health transparency Sam Harris
1aac290 If we are on the outside, we assume a conspiracy is the perfect working scheme. Silent nameless men with unadorned hearts. A conspiracy is everything that ordinary life is not. It's the inside game, cold, sure, undistracted, forever closed off to us. We are the flawed ones, the innocents, trying to make some rough sense of the daily jostle. Conspirators have a logic and daring beyond our reach. All conspiracies are the same taut story of men who find coherence in some criminal act. crime lies perception truth Don DeLillo
da04ccf For if this God exists, I thought, and if even you - with your lusts and your adulteries and the timid lies you used to tell - can change like this, we could all be saints by leaping as you leapt, by shutting the eyes and leaping once and for all: if you are a saint, it's not so difficult to be a saint. It's something He can demand of any of us, leap. god lies lust saints sin Graham Greene
b216fe7 The truth will set you free, its the little white lies that'll save your ass. lies truth James Patterson
cc4ff34 Before one can learn truth, one must unlearn lies. lies truth Matthew Woodring Stover
0633ab0 People don't want the truth,' he says, waving a hand at the streets around us. 'They want better-quality lies. High definition lies on fifty-inch screens. lies modernity truth Paul Murray
dea569f ...the terrible crumple and blanch of a lie come undone... lie lies run truth Ann Patchett
a136f7d "When an orphan is depressed," wrote Wilbur Larch, "he is attracted to telling lies. A lie is at least a vigorous enterprise, it keeps you on your toes by making you suddenly responsible for what happens because of it. You must be alert to lie, and stay alert to keep your lie a secret. Orphans are not the masters of their fates; they are the last to believe you if you tell them that other people are also not in charge of theirs. When you lie, it makes you feel in charge of your life. Telling lies is very seductive to orphans. I know," Dr. Larch wrote. "I know because I tell them, too. I love to lie. When you lie, you feel as if you have cheated fate--your own, and everybody else's." lies John Irving
232fdaa Truth or lie... he had always chosen the lie, to spare his little brother any unpleasant truth. brothers family fantasy liar lies siblings truth-or-lie young-adult-fantasy Cornelia Funke
47d2729 Because though women lie when they have to and men lie all the time, the mirror always tells the truth. lies Jane Yolen
2669b2b I'm very gullible when it comes to my own words. I believe everything I say, though I know I'm a liar. lies lying Roger Zelazny
e519206 A life without envy, hatred and lies was not a life worth living. hatred lies madame-de-prie twilight Stefan Zweig
1 2 ▲ ▼