Search quotes

Link	Quote	Tags	Author
2eb33b1	I want to be cut off from people like Marloe. Being a real person oneself is a matter of setting up limits and drawing lines and saying no. I don't want to be a nebulous bit of ectoplasm straying around in other people's lives. That sort of vague sympathy with everybody precludes any real understanding of anybody . . . And it precludes any real loyalty to anybody.	understanding relationships discerning setting-limits the-black-prince iris-murdoch loner loyalty	Iris Murdoch
587585c	The world is perhaps ultimately to be defined as a place of suffering. Man is a suffering animal, subject to ceaseless anxiety and pain and fear.	suffering the-human-condition the-black-prince iris-murdoch worldview nihilism the-world pessimism	Iris Murdoch
7d9be3a	I just want to serve and help people and be good to everybody, only it always goes wrong somehow--I think about suicide all the time, every bloody day I want to die and stop this torture, but I go crawling on . . . I'm so Christ-awful bloody lonely I could scream with it for hours on end.	loneliness desperate rejected unlucky the-black-prince iris-murdoch selfless suicidal	Iris Murdoch
f79e3d0	Most friendships are a sort of frozen and undeveloping semi-hostility.	relationships friendship hostility the-black-prince iris-murdoch stagnant resentment	Iris Murdoch
a8d219c	He was glad that he had expressed to her, however blunderingly, what he felt. He was glad that he had held her hand.	holding-hands the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch no-regrets	Iris Murdoch
9f3a0e8	The agony was of suddenly feeling herself so separate and so secret.	secret the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch isolated secretive separate	Iris Murdoch
d49d9d9	Tal como nos conocemos, somos objetos falsos, imposturas, ramilletes de ilusiones" "Los juicios sobre las personas no son jamas decisivos, surgen de resumenes que inmediatamente hacen pensar en la necesidad de una reconsideracion. Los arreglos humanos no son otra cosa que cabos sueltos y calculos nebulosos, independientemente de cualquier cosa que para consolarnos pueda fingir el arte"		Iris Murdoch
d22274c	He felt himself falling into a state, very common when he was younger, of being totally cut off from the society he was in.	the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch social-anxiety dissociation outsider	Iris Murdoch
bb2fd38	How sad for those who cannot enjoy what are after all prime pleasures of daily life, and perhaps for some the only ones, eating and drinking.	drinking the-sea-the-sea iris-murdoch eating pleasures food	Iris Murdoch
ce22cd8	What the cold light showed me was that my situation was simply unlivable. I wanted, with a desire greater than any desire which I had ever conceived could exist without instantly killing its owner by spontaneous combustion, something which I simply could not have.	unlivable the-black-prince iris-murdoch wanting suicidal hopeless unrequited-love	Iris Murdoch
4aecd94	And all the time my very soul would travel with her, invisible and crying soundlessly with pain. I had acquired a dimension of suffering which would poison and devour my whole being, as far as I could see, forever.	pain suffering unending unendurable the-black-prince unspoken soul unrequited-love	Iris Murdoch
e3e2821	I contemplated her, seeing her young bland face looking at me, now removed as if behind a gauze curtain. She quietly invited me to suffer. There was a great space now, a great silent hall in which this suffering could take place. There was no urgency now, nothing to plan, nothing to achieve. What shall I do with it, I asked her, what shall I do now with my love for you which you so terribly revived by reappearing in my life? Why did you com..	love the-sea-the-sea unrequited-love	Iris Murdoch
089664c	But the spark vanished, there was no longed-for recognition, no dawning sign of recovery. The love she had learnt in tending him was an enclosed love, muted and maimed, already mourning. They would never communicate now.	missed-opportunity star-crossed-lovers the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch unspoken sad unrequited-love	Iris Murdoch
fb14f8a	She could not bear the tenderness which a dog would evoke, she did not want the pain of another love. She knew how very much, how desperately, she would love her dog; and dogs are vulnerable and short-lived and die.	love the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch painful tenderness pets	Iris Murdoch
8a2c8de	And she wondered now how she could go on existing through the successive moments of her life.	life unbearable iris-murdoch	Iris Murdoch
507f705	I can't tell you--oh I can't tell you--how awful--how sort of unlivable--everything is now--like a great black wall in front of me--Something's got to smash.	simile depression change unbearable unlivable henry-and-cato iris-murdoch	Iris Murdoch
7a4b017	I tried deep breathing, but seemed to lose contact with myself between each breath, so that the next one was always an emergency. I began to feel faint.	humor deep-breathing panic-attack the-black-prince iris-murdoch dissociation	Iris Murdoch
2f07ad3	But I can't do anything for him and he can't do anything for me. We must wail in our own corners.	grief comfortless the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch isolated	Iris Murdoch
0f438df	Hasta cierto punto estoy de acuerdo contigo --dijo Rupert-- pero... --No hay "peros", querido amigo, Kant nos mostro de modo concluyente que no podemos conocer la realidad. Sin embargo, seguimos creyendo obstinadamente que si podemos. --!Kant creia que tenemos atisbos de ella! !Eso era precisamente en lo que insistia! --Kant era estupidamente cristiano. Y tambien nosotros lo somos, aunque lo neguemos. El cristianismo es una de las mas grand..	cristiano humana kant raza realidad	Iris Murdoch
620cba0	To say we were 'in love', that vague weakened phrase, cannot express it. We loved each other, we lived in each other, through each other, by each other. We were each other. Why was it such pure unadulterated pain?	love the-sea-the-sea iris-murdoch	Iris Murdoch
db16a6c	I'm not like other people, my life just doesn't work, it never has.	life lament unlucky the-black-prince iris-murdoch outsider difference	Iris Murdoch
ace7549	But I live, I , with an absolutely continuous sense of failure. I am always defeated, always.	dejected unrelenting the-black-prince iris-murdoch low-self-esteem despairing failure	Iris Murdoch
5a2b9d2	Those who occasion loss of dignity are hard to forgive.	loss-of-dignity the-black-prince iris-murdoch unforgivable grudge	Iris Murdoch
5a2b875	She was not just a wild creature, she was a wounded creature.	the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch wounded wild	Iris Murdoch
073aec2	How fearful that dark shadow is when we catch sight of it in the life of another. No wonder those at whom that black arrow is aimed so often turn and flee. How unendurable it can be, the love another bears us. I would never persecute my darling with that dread knowledge. From now onward until the world ended everything must remain, although utterly changed, exactly as it was before.	love the-black-prince iris-murdoch selfless unspoken unrequited-love	Iris Murdoch
2ff31c8	How could it be that I had actually kissed her cheek without enveloping her, without becoming her? How could I at that moment have refrained from kneeling at her feet and howling?	kiss love passionate-love howling the-black-prince iris-murdoch dramatic soul-mates desire	Iris Murdoch
d2a31ee	You see, I'm not mad, I suffer from depression. It's not like ordinary misery. It's like dying of boredom. It's .	madness depression the-green-knight iris-murdoch misery	Iris Murdoch
c1d47c0	There were good times or goodish times, only the bad times were so--crucial.	abusive-household bad-times crucial formative-years the-sea-the-sea iris-murdoch good-times	Iris Murdoch
f0518c2	The unspoken words trembled in the air.	trembled the-message-to-the-planet unspoken	Iris Murdoch
2061f9a	He said, 'Forgive me for being a liar and a fool and an utterly worthless man.' Louise replied, 'I love you.' He took her in his arms for a moment and they held each other with closed eyes.	tender embrace declaration-of-love the-green-knight iris-murdoch unconditional-love confession dialogue	Iris Murdoch
31f0f02	He did not touch her but enjoyed the particular intimate pain of the tension between them.	pain intimate the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch tension	Iris Murdoch
74035e9	Sometimes one feels suddenly doomed by fate.	fate doomed the-black-prince iris-murdoch premonition foreboding	Iris Murdoch
99bb922	It was for me a moment of great peace. I did not know then that it was the last, the very last moment of peace, the end of the old innocent world, the final moment before I was plunged into the nightmare of which these ensuing pages tell the story.	narrator iris-murdoch peace nightmare foreshadowing	Iris Murdoch
1e592e9	One can be too ingenious in trying to search out the truth. Sometimes one must simply respect its veiled face. Of course this is a love story.	love-story truth ambiguity the-sea-the-sea unknowable iris-murdoch mysterious	Iris Murdoch
5d08208	Oh what an ill fate it was that has made me love that man.	love toxic-relationships the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch misfortune	Iris Murdoch
f128833	Some people are just 'diminishers' and 'spoilers' for others. I suppose almost everybody diminishes someone. A saint would be nobody's spoiler.	toxic-relationships the-black-prince toxic-people	Iris Murdoch
e74d8b4	Tell her I was young once and star-bright Who am now invisible . . .	poetry henry-and-cato iris-murdoch invisible young	Iris Murdoch
4f4ad79	Oh my life is so awful, it's just so awful to be me, you don't know what it's like waking every morning and finding the whole horror of being yourself still there.	depression identity life the-black-prince iris-murdoch unhappy self-loathing trapped horror	Iris Murdoch
9707da8	I adore your jealousy, especially when it's so misplaced. I expect Shakespeare wrote a sonnet about that.	jealousy humor misplaced the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch	Iris Murdoch
3d65918	I just hope -- if he does come -- it won't be some sort of horror show.	arrival horrifying horror-show iris-murdoch horror foreshadowing	Iris Murdoch
59fe39b	Those who cry out the truth to an indifferent world too often weary, fall silent or come to doubt their own wit.	in-vain unheeded the-black-prince iris-murdoch	Iris Murdoch
e0d7d64	He wanted to be a universal man . . . and I suppose that isn't possible now. He belongs in fifteenth-century Italy. This age doesn't suit him.	out-of-time out-of-place the-message-to-the-planet old-soul	Iris Murdoch
38b41d8	He suffers terribly all the time. He lives in fire.	metaphor suffering endless-suffering relentless the-green-knight iris-murdoch torture	Iris Murdoch
e82208d	I felt so ashamed with them because everything in their life was going so well and they were so sort of successful. I couldn't talk about what I wanted with them and they were always in a hurry.	jealous not-wanted out-of-place the-black-prince iris-murdoch outsider unspoken inferiority shame	Iris Murdoch

2eb33b1

I want to be cut off from people like Marloe. Being a real person oneself is a matter of setting up limits and drawing lines and saying no. I don't want to be a nebulous bit of ectoplasm straying around in other people's lives. That sort of vague sympathy with everybody precludes any real understanding of anybody . . . And it precludes any real loyalty to anybody.

understanding relationships discerning setting-limits the-black-prince iris-murdoch loner loyalty

Iris Murdoch

587585c

The world is perhaps ultimately to be defined as a place of suffering. Man is a suffering animal, subject to ceaseless anxiety and pain and fear.

suffering the-human-condition the-black-prince iris-murdoch worldview nihilism the-world pessimism

Iris Murdoch

7d9be3a

I just want to serve and help people and be good to everybody, only it always goes wrong somehow--I think about suicide all the time, every bloody day I want to die and stop this torture, but I go crawling on . . . I'm so Christ-awful bloody lonely I could scream with it for hours on end.

loneliness desperate rejected unlucky the-black-prince iris-murdoch selfless suicidal

Iris Murdoch

f79e3d0

Most friendships are a sort of frozen and undeveloping semi-hostility.

relationships friendship hostility the-black-prince iris-murdoch stagnant resentment

Iris Murdoch

a8d219c

He was glad that he had expressed to her, however blunderingly, what he felt. He was glad that he had held her hand.

holding-hands the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch no-regrets

Iris Murdoch

9f3a0e8

The agony was of suddenly feeling herself so separate and so secret.

secret the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch isolated secretive separate

Iris Murdoch

d49d9d9

Tal como nos conocemos, somos objetos falsos, imposturas, ramilletes de ilusiones" "Los juicios sobre las personas no son jamas decisivos, surgen de resumenes que inmediatamente hacen pensar en la necesidad de una reconsideracion. Los arreglos humanos no son otra cosa que cabos sueltos y calculos nebulosos, independientemente de cualquier cosa que para consolarnos pueda fingir el arte"

Iris Murdoch

d22274c

He felt himself falling into a state, very common when he was younger, of being totally cut off from the society he was in.

the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch social-anxiety dissociation outsider

Iris Murdoch

bb2fd38

How sad for those who cannot enjoy what are after all prime pleasures of daily life, and perhaps for some the only ones, eating and drinking.

drinking the-sea-the-sea iris-murdoch eating pleasures food

Iris Murdoch

ce22cd8

What the cold light showed me was that my situation was simply unlivable. I wanted, with a desire greater than any desire which I had ever conceived could exist without instantly killing its owner by spontaneous combustion, something which I simply could not have.

unlivable the-black-prince iris-murdoch wanting suicidal hopeless unrequited-love

Iris Murdoch

4aecd94

And all the time my very soul would travel with her, invisible and crying soundlessly with pain. I had acquired a dimension of suffering which would poison and devour my whole being, as far as I could see, forever.

pain suffering unending unendurable the-black-prince unspoken soul unrequited-love

Iris Murdoch

e3e2821

I contemplated her, seeing her young bland face looking at me, now removed as if behind a gauze curtain. She quietly invited me to suffer. There was a great space now, a great silent hall in which this suffering could take place. There was no urgency now, nothing to plan, nothing to achieve. What shall I do with it, I asked her, what shall I do now with my love for you which you so terribly revived by reappearing in my life? Why did you com..

love the-sea-the-sea unrequited-love

Iris Murdoch

089664c

But the spark vanished, there was no longed-for recognition, no dawning sign of recovery. The love she had learnt in tending him was an enclosed love, muted and maimed, already mourning. They would never communicate now.

missed-opportunity star-crossed-lovers the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch unspoken sad unrequited-love

Iris Murdoch

fb14f8a

She could not bear the tenderness which a dog would evoke, she did not want the pain of another love. She knew how very much, how desperately, she would love her dog; and dogs are vulnerable and short-lived and die.

love the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch painful tenderness pets

Iris Murdoch

8a2c8de

And she wondered now how she could go on existing through the successive moments of her life.

life unbearable iris-murdoch

Iris Murdoch

507f705

I can't tell you--oh I can't tell you--how awful--how sort of unlivable--everything is now--like a great black wall in front of me--Something's got to smash.

simile depression change unbearable unlivable henry-and-cato iris-murdoch

Iris Murdoch

7a4b017

I tried deep breathing, but seemed to lose contact with myself between each breath, so that the next one was always an emergency. I began to feel faint.

humor deep-breathing panic-attack the-black-prince iris-murdoch dissociation

Iris Murdoch

2f07ad3

But I can't do anything for him and he can't do anything for me. We must wail in our own corners.

grief comfortless the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch isolated

Iris Murdoch

0f438df

Hasta cierto punto estoy de acuerdo contigo --dijo Rupert-- pero... --No hay "peros", querido amigo, Kant nos mostro de modo concluyente que no podemos conocer la realidad. Sin embargo, seguimos creyendo obstinadamente que si podemos. --!Kant creia que tenemos atisbos de ella! !Eso era precisamente en lo que insistia! --Kant era estupidamente cristiano. Y tambien nosotros lo somos, aunque lo neguemos. El cristianismo es una de las mas grand..

cristiano humana kant raza realidad

Iris Murdoch

620cba0

To say we were 'in love', that vague weakened phrase, cannot express it. We loved each other, we lived in each other, through each other, by each other. We were each other. Why was it such pure unadulterated pain?

love the-sea-the-sea iris-murdoch

Iris Murdoch

db16a6c

I'm not like other people, my life just doesn't work, it never has.

life lament unlucky the-black-prince iris-murdoch outsider difference

Iris Murdoch

ace7549

But I live, I , with an absolutely continuous sense of failure. I am always defeated, always.

dejected unrelenting the-black-prince iris-murdoch low-self-esteem despairing failure

Iris Murdoch

5a2b9d2

Those who occasion loss of dignity are hard to forgive.

loss-of-dignity the-black-prince iris-murdoch unforgivable grudge

Iris Murdoch

5a2b875

She was not just a wild creature, she was a wounded creature.

the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch wounded wild

Iris Murdoch

073aec2

How fearful that dark shadow is when we catch sight of it in the life of another. No wonder those at whom that black arrow is aimed so often turn and flee. How unendurable it can be, the love another bears us. I would never persecute my darling with that dread knowledge. From now onward until the world ended everything must remain, although utterly changed, exactly as it was before.

love the-black-prince iris-murdoch selfless unspoken unrequited-love

Iris Murdoch

2ff31c8

How could it be that I had actually kissed her cheek without enveloping her, without becoming her? How could I at that moment have refrained from kneeling at her feet and howling?

kiss love passionate-love howling the-black-prince iris-murdoch dramatic soul-mates desire

Iris Murdoch

d2a31ee

You see, I'm not mad, I suffer from depression. It's not like ordinary misery. It's like dying of boredom. It's .

madness depression the-green-knight iris-murdoch misery

Iris Murdoch

c1d47c0

There were good times or goodish times, only the bad times were so--crucial.

abusive-household bad-times crucial formative-years the-sea-the-sea iris-murdoch good-times

Iris Murdoch

f0518c2

The unspoken words trembled in the air.

trembled the-message-to-the-planet unspoken

Iris Murdoch

2061f9a

He said, 'Forgive me for being a liar and a fool and an utterly worthless man.' Louise replied, 'I love you.' He took her in his arms for a moment and they held each other with closed eyes.

tender embrace declaration-of-love the-green-knight iris-murdoch unconditional-love confession dialogue

Iris Murdoch

31f0f02

He did not touch her but enjoyed the particular intimate pain of the tension between them.

pain intimate the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch tension

Iris Murdoch

74035e9

Sometimes one feels suddenly doomed by fate.

fate doomed the-black-prince iris-murdoch premonition foreboding

Iris Murdoch

99bb922

It was for me a moment of great peace. I did not know then that it was the last, the very last moment of peace, the end of the old innocent world, the final moment before I was plunged into the nightmare of which these ensuing pages tell the story.

narrator iris-murdoch peace nightmare foreshadowing

Iris Murdoch

1e592e9

One can be too ingenious in trying to search out the truth. Sometimes one must simply respect its veiled face. Of course this is a love story.

love-story truth ambiguity the-sea-the-sea unknowable iris-murdoch mysterious

Iris Murdoch

5d08208

Oh what an ill fate it was that has made me love that man.

love toxic-relationships the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch misfortune

Iris Murdoch

f128833

Some people are just 'diminishers' and 'spoilers' for others. I suppose almost everybody diminishes someone. A saint would be nobody's spoiler.

toxic-relationships the-black-prince toxic-people

Iris Murdoch

e74d8b4

Tell her I was young once and star-bright Who am now invisible . . .

poetry henry-and-cato iris-murdoch invisible young

Iris Murdoch

4f4ad79

Oh my life is so awful, it's just so awful to be me, you don't know what it's like waking every morning and finding the whole horror of being yourself still there.

depression identity life the-black-prince iris-murdoch unhappy self-loathing trapped horror

Iris Murdoch

9707da8

I adore your jealousy, especially when it's so misplaced. I expect Shakespeare wrote a sonnet about that.

jealousy humor misplaced the-message-to-the-planet iris-murdoch

Iris Murdoch

3d65918

I just hope -- if he does come -- it won't be some sort of horror show.

arrival horrifying horror-show iris-murdoch horror foreshadowing

Iris Murdoch

59fe39b

Those who cry out the truth to an indifferent world too often weary, fall silent or come to doubt their own wit.

in-vain unheeded the-black-prince iris-murdoch

Iris Murdoch

e0d7d64

He wanted to be a universal man . . . and I suppose that isn't possible now. He belongs in fifteenth-century Italy. This age doesn't suit him.

out-of-time out-of-place the-message-to-the-planet old-soul

Iris Murdoch

38b41d8

He suffers terribly all the time. He lives in fire.

metaphor suffering endless-suffering relentless the-green-knight iris-murdoch torture

Iris Murdoch

e82208d

I felt so ashamed with them because everything in their life was going so well and they were so sort of successful. I couldn't talk about what I wanted with them and they were always in a hurry.

jealous not-wanted out-of-place the-black-prince iris-murdoch outsider unspoken inferiority shame

Iris Murdoch