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I 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 Golding

One’s intelligence may march about and about a problem, but the solution does not come gradually into view. One moment it is not. The next it is there.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Come Gradually Intelligent March May One Problem Solution View
The greatest pleasure is not – say – sex or geometry. It is just understanding. And if you can get people to understand their own humanity – well, that’s the job of the writer.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Geometry Get Greatest Humanity Own People Pleasure Say Sex Understanding
And I’ve been wearing specs since I was three.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Been Since Specs Three Wear
While 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 GOLDING

All Discipline Extent Myself Off While
The trouble was, if you were a chief you had to think, you had to be wise.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Chief Think Trouble Wise
We just got to go on, that’s all. That’s what grownups would do.
WILLIAM GOLDING

All Do Go Grown Up Just On
Art is partly communication, but only partly. The rest is discovery.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Art Communication Discover Partly Rest
Heaven lies around us in our infancy.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Around Heaven Infancy Lie Our
It may be — I hope it is — redemption to guess and perhaps perceive that the universe, the hell which we see for all its beauty, vastness, majesty, is only part of a whole which is quite unimaginable.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Beauty Guess Hell Hope Majesty May Perhaps Redemption See Universe Vastness
The thing is – fear can’t hurt you any more than a dream.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Dream Fear Hurt More Thing
Together, joined in effort by the burden, they staggered up the last steep of the mountain. Together, they chanted One! Two! Three! and crashed the log on to the great pile. Then they stepped back, laughing with triumphant pleasure.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Burden Chant Effort Join Last Mountain Sleep Staggered Together Two
Every novel is a biography. Well, then, this is a novel [The Paper Men] which is a biography that is pretending to be an autobiography. That’s what you could say about it.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Appear Biography Emn Every Novel Pretend Well
Are we savages or what?
WILLIAM GOLDING

All Savage What
At the moment of vision, the eyes see nothing.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Eyes Moment Nothing See Vision
We’ve got to have rules and obey them. After all, we’re not savages. We’re English, and the English are best at everything.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Best English Everything Obey Rule Savage Them
Marx, Darwin and Freud are the three most crashing bores of the Western World. Simplistic popularization of their ideas has thrust our world into a mental straitjacket from which we can only escape by the most anarchic violence.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Bore Country Crash Most People Person Western World
I am by nature an optimist and by intellectual conviction a pessimist.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Condition Intelectual Nature Optimist Pessimist
There is, they say, no fool like an old fool.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Fool Like Old Say
Only one novel is a novel: that is a successful novel.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Novel One Only Successful
A crowd of grade-three thinkers, all shouting the same thing, all warming their hands at the fire of their own prejudices, will not thank you for pointing out the contradictions in their beliefs. Man is a gregarious animal, and enjoys agreement as cows will graze all the same way on the side of a hill.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Crow Grade Hand Prejudice Same Shout Thing Thinker Warning
They walked along, two continents of experience and feeling unable to communicate.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Along Communicate Continent Experience Feel Unable Walk
Which is better, law and rescue, or hunting and breaking things up?
WILLIAM GOLDING

Better Break Hunt Law Rescue Thing Up
However you disguise novels, they are always biographies.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Always Biography Disguise Novel
Of the authors writing in English, I’d mention Shakespeare and Milton. But all this is terribly high-hat and makes me sound very po-faced, I’m afraid; however, I just happen to like these enormous, swinging, great creatures.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Author Country English Face Hat High Make Mention Pe People Person Sound Terrible Very Write
What a man does defiles him, not what is done by others.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Believe Define Done Man Other
His mind was crowded with memories; memories of the knowledge that had come to them when they closed in on the struggling pig, knowledge that they had outwitted a living thing, imposed their will upon it, taken away its life like a long satisfying drink.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Close Come Crowd Knowledge Memories Min Pig Struggling Them
There were no words, and no movements but the tearing of teeth and claws.
WILLIAM GOLDING

Claw Movement No Teeth Tera Word

I 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.

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Popular Authors

I 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.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More William Golding Quotes