He who rides the sea of the Nile must have sails woven of patience.
WILLIAM GOLDINGSleep is when all the unsorted stuff comes flying out as from a dustbin upset in a high wind.
More William Golding Quotes
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I know there isn’t no beast-not with claws and all that, I mean-but I know there isn’t no fear, either.” Piggy paused. “Unless-” Ralph moved restlessly. “Unless what?” “Unless we get frightened of people.
WILLIAM GOLDING -
Which is better — to be a pack of painted Indians like you are, or to be sensible like Ralph is? Which is better — to have rules and agree, or to hunt and kill? Which is better, law and rescue, or hunting and breaking things up?
WILLIAM GOLDING -
Life’s scientific, but we don’t know, do we? Not certainly, I mean.
WILLIAM GOLDING -
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 -
Life should serve up its feast of experience in a series of courses.
WILLIAM GOLDING -
Kill the pig! Cut his throat! Kill the pig! Bash him in!
WILLIAM GOLDING -
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 -
I don’t think they [contemporary writers] read me either. I mean, if we’re concerned genuinely with writing, I think we probably get on with our work.
WILLIAM GOLDING -
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 -
Heaven lies around us in our infancy.
WILLIAM GOLDING -
How would I myself live in this proposed society? How long would it be before I went stark staring mad?
WILLIAM GOLDING -
What kind of human person has a favorite eraser?
WILLIAM GOLDING -
This is our island. It’s a good island. Until the grownups come to fetch us we’ll have fun.
WILLIAM GOLDING -
The beast was harmless and horrible; and the news must reach the others as soon as possible.
WILLIAM GOLDING -
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 -
Are we savages or what?
WILLIAM GOLDING -
We have a disharmony in our natures. We cannot live together without injuring each other.
WILLIAM GOLDING -
I am by nature an optimist and by intellectual conviction a pessimist.
WILLIAM GOLDING -
But forgiveness must not only be given but received also.
WILLIAM GOLDING -
I am here; and here is nowhere in particular.
WILLIAM GOLDING -
And I’ve been wearing specs since I was three.
WILLIAM GOLDING -
People don’t help much.
WILLIAM GOLDING -
He doesn’t mind if he dies… indeed, he would like to die; but yet he fears to fall. He would welcome a long sleep; but not at the price of falling to it.
WILLIAM GOLDING -
At the moment of vision, the eyes see nothing.
WILLIAM GOLDING -
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 -
If faces were different when lit from above or below — what was a face? What was anything?
WILLIAM GOLDING