Language fits over experience like a straight-jacket.
WILLIAM GOLDINGLanguage fits over experience like a straight-jacket.
WILLIAM GOLDINGHonestly, I haven’t the time to read contemporary writers. I know this is awful, but in the main it is true.
WILLIAM GOLDINGRalph wept for the end of innocence, the darkness of man’s heart, and the fall through the air of the true, wise friend called Piggy.
WILLIAM GOLDINGGraham Greene at 82 years old was still writing, and I don’t think anyone can deny the force, the expertise, and the unique quality of his writing, if you take his complete oeuvre.
WILLIAM GOLDINGI do think that art that doesn’t communicate is useless.
WILLIAM GOLDINGI do like people to read the books twice, because I write my novels about ideas which concern me deeply and I think are important, and therefore I want people to take them seriously. And to read it twice of course is taking it seriously.
WILLIAM GOLDINGThere’s a kinship among men who have sat by a dying fire and measured the worth of their life by it.
WILLIAM GOLDINGI think women are foolish to pretend they are equal to men, they are far superior and always have been.
WILLIAM GOLDINGthe conch exploded into a thousand white fragments and ceased to exist.
WILLIAM GOLDINGWhich is better–to have laws and agree, or to hunt and kill?
WILLIAM GOLDINGHe who rides the sea of the Nile must have sails woven of patience.
WILLIAM GOLDINGFancy thinking the Beast was something you could hunt and kill! You knew, didn’t you? I’m part of you? Close, close, close! I’m the reason why it’s no go? Why things are what they are?
WILLIAM GOLDINGWhile I am on, I can discipline myself to that extent. When I am off, I can’t discipline myself at all. On the other hand, when I am off, there are so many things I like doing, it doesn’t really matter.
WILLIAM GOLDINGThe mask was a thing on it’s own, behind which Jack hid, liberated from shame and self-conciousness.
WILLIAM GOLDINGWe’re not savages. We’re English.
WILLIAM GOLDINGNothing is so impenetrable as laughter in a language you don’t understand.
WILLIAM GOLDING