John Fowles Quotations | Page 2

Most marriages recognize this paradox: Passion destroys passion; we want what puts an end to wanting what we want.

In essence the Renaissance was simply the green end of one of civilization's hardest winters.

even more ominous ... is the fact that since the Second World War a new kind of intellectual has emerged in large numbers. ... he is only minimally interested in the proper intellectual significance of images and objects. Such people are not really intellectuals, but visuals ... A visual is more interested in style than in content ... A visual does not feel a rioting crowd being machine-gunned by the police, he simply sees a brilliant news photograph.

Which are you drinking? The water or the wave?

An aphorism is a generalization, therefore not modern.

All pasts are like poems; one can derive a thousand things, but not live in them.

Duty largely consists of pretending that the trivial is critical.

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

That is the great distinction between the sexes. Men see objects, women seetherelationship between objects? It is an extra dimension of feeling which we men are without and one that makes war abhorrent to all real women?and absurd.

That is the great distinction between the sexes. Men see objects, women see the relationships between objects.