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I am by nature an optimist and by intellectual conviction a pessimist.

William Golding

No human endeavour can ever be wholly good… it must always have a cost.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Coat Endeavour God Human Must Wholly
I play the piano passionately and inaccurately. Indeed, I worked out the other day that of my seventy-five years; I have spent at least one year sitting on a piano stool.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Day Five Inaccurately Indeed Other Passionate Piano Play Seventy Work Year
At the moment of vision, the eyes see nothing.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Eyes Moment Nothing See Vision
Ralph… would treat the day’s decisions as though he were playing chess. The only trouble was that he would never be a very good chess player.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Chess Country Decision People Play Through
Art is partly communication, but only partly. The rest is discovery.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Art Communication Discover Partly Rest
It wasn’t until I was 37 that I grasped the great truth that you’ve got to write your own books and nobody else’s, and then everything followed from there.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Book Else Everything Follow Grasp Great Nobody Own Seven Thirty Truth Until
I’m scared of him,” said Piggy, “and that’s why I know him. If you’re scared of someone you hate him but you can’t stop thinking about him. You kid yourself he’s all right really, an’ then when you see him again; it’s like asthma an’ you can’t breathe.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Hate Known Piggy Scare Someone Think
One tries to tell a truth, and one hopes that the truth has a general application rather than just a specific one.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Application General Hope One Specific Tell Truth Try
We did everything adults would do. What went wrong?
WILLIAM GOLDING

Adult Everything Went Wrong
We’re all mad, the whole damned race. We’re wrapped in illusions, delusions, confusions about the penetrability of partitions, we’re all mad and in solitary confinement.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Confusion Delusion Illusion Mad Partition Peenetrablity Race Whole Dammed Wrap
What kind of human person has a favorite eraser?
WILLIAM GOLDING

Eraser Favorite Human Kind Person
Fancy 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 GOLDING

Beast Close Fancy Kill Knew Part Something Think
I began to write when I was seven, and I have been writing off and on ever since. It is still off and on. You can say that when I am on, when I know I have a book which I am going to write, then I write two thousand words a day. That’s so many pages longhand.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Been Began Ever Off Say Seven Since Still When Write You
As soon as Oliver Twist is serialized, people who would never dream of reading [Charles] Dickens, if they hadn’t seen him on their box, buy the paperback.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Box Country Dream never People Person Raed Seen Serialized Soon
The skull regarded Ralph like one who knows all the answers and won’t tell.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Answer Country Know Like People Regard Skull Tell
You have the older generation like Iris Murdoch and Angus Wilson who are not as old as Graham Greene, but still are coming on. I dare say anyone who knew the scene better than I know it could fill it in with a very satisfactory supply of novels.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Come Country Generation Holder Like One People Still

I am by nature an optimist and by intellectual conviction a pessimist.

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I am by nature an optimist and by intellectual conviction a pessimist.

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