black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

Even at the time, I realised this couldn’t be right, that this interpretation didn’t fit with the rest of the lyrics. But that wasn’t an issue with me. The song was about what I said, and I used to listen to it again and again, on my own, whenever I got the chance.

Kazuo Ishiguro

I was a little concerned that a lot of people thought I wrote Merchant Ivory movies. I also thought if I was ever going to write something strange and difficult, that was the time.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Difficult People Story Strange Thinking Time Writing
Don’t you wonder sometimes, what might have happened if you tried?
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Inspirational Motivational Time Wonderful Yourself
What interests me is the surprising enormous extent to which most people accept the fate that’s been given to them, and find some dignity.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Acceptance Dignity Interest Myself People
And I’m a Hailsham student – which is enough by itself sometimes to get people’s backs up.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Enough Myself People Student Time
Its was one of those events which at a crucial stage in one’s development arrive to challenge and stretch one to the limit of one’s ability and beyond, so that thereafter one has a new standard by which to judge oneself.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Ability Challenge Development Judgement Limitation Oneself
We all live inside bodies that will deteriorate. But when you look at human beings, they’re capable of very decent things: love, loyalty. When time is running out, they don’t care about possessions or status. They want to put things right if they’ve done wrong.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Body Care Human Live Love Loyalty Possession Right Status Wrong Yourself
There is certainly a satisfaction and dignity to be gained in coming to terms with the mistakes one has made in the course of one’s life.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Life Mistake Oneself Satisfaction
If you are under the impression you have already perfected yourself, you will never rise to the heights you are no doubt capable of.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Capability Doubt Impression Perfection Rise Yourself
Sometimes I get so immersed in my own company, if I unexpectedly run into someone I know, it’s a bit of a shock and takes me a while to adjust.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Company Expectation Myself Time
People aren’t quite sure what it means when a book is a Booker Prize winner. They’re not quite sure what is being recommended, what literary values it stands for, because every year it stands for something different.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Book Different People Quite Stand Value Winner
Memory, I realize, can be an unreliable thing; often it is heavily coloured by the circumstances in which one remembers.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Color Memories Oneself Remember
There’s still a part of me that thinks I have to write a really good novel. I’m not trying to say I’m not happy with the novels I’ve written in the past. But it always feels to me like there’s another one that I have to write that will really say what I want to say, and really paint this world that I can see hazily in my head.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Goodness Happiness Head Myself Novel Thinking World Writing
I grew up in Britain before it became a multicultural place, so in many ways I have a nostalgia for an England that’s vanished – the England of my childhood has actually disappeared.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Childhood Disappear Growth Nostalgia Place Way
It had never occurred to me that our lives, which had been so closely interwoven, could unravel with such speed.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Live Ourselves Philosophy Relationship
I think I had actually served my apprenticeship as a writer of fiction by writing all those songs. I had already been through phases of autobiographical or experimental stuff.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Experience Fiction Service Stuff Thinking Writing
It is one of the enjoyments of retirement that you are able to drift through the day at your own pace, easy in the knowledge that you have put hard work and achievement behind you.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Achievement Day Easy Enjoyment Hard Work Knowledge Yourself
There are things I am more interested in than the clone thing. How are they trying to find their place in the world and make sense of their lives? To what extent can they transcend their fate? As time starts to run out, what are the things that really matter?
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Fate Imitation Interest Myself Run Science Time Transcendence World
Memory is quite central for me. Part of it is that I like the actual texture of writing through memory.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Memories Memory Quite Writing
What is pertinent is the calmness of that beauty, its sense of restraint.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Beautiful Calm Wisdom
The world is crawling with authors touring now. They’re like performance artists.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Artist Author Performance World
You say you’re sure? Sure that you’re in love? How can you know it? You think love is so simple?
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Love Simplicity Yourself
There comes a point when you can more or less count the number of books you’re going to write before you die.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Book Count Death Writing Yourself
As I say, I have never in all these years thought of the matter in quite this way; but then it is perhaps in the nature of coming away on a trip such as this that one is prompted towards such surprising new perspectives on topics one imagined one had long ago thought throughly.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Imagination Myself Nature Quite Travel
Even the solitude, I’ve actually grown to quite like. I do like the feeling of getting into my little car, knowing for the next couple of hours I’ll have only the roads, the big gray sky and my daydreams for company.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Company Feeling Growth Myself Road Solitude
I think it’s quite difficult to understand what kind of life a writer leads. They might be millionaires, or they might be starving people.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Difficult Life Myself People Quite Starve Thinking
I think there is a huge difference between writers who have very big sales, and writers who have small sales. Even writers with very high reputations, even Nobel prize winners, often sell in very low figures.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Difference Reputation Thinking Winner Writing
As a writer, I’m more interested in what people tell themselves happened rather than what actually happened.
KAZUO ISHIGURO

Myself People Writing

Even at the time, I realised this couldn’t be right, that this interpretation didn’t fit with the rest of the lyrics. But that wasn’t an issue with me. The song was about what I said, and I used to listen to it again and again, on my own, whenever I got the chance.

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Even at the time, I realised this couldn’t be right, that this interpretation didn’t fit with the rest of the lyrics. But that wasn’t an issue with me. The song was about what I said, and I used to listen to it again and again, on my own, whenever I got the chance.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Kazuo Ishiguro Quotes