Ian McEwan citáty

strana 2

„Opakem nihilismu je kreativita. Nálada vybízející ke změnám, hlad po individuální svobodě, jež se teď šíří Blízkým východem. To vše připomíná nové možnosti spíš, než hrozbu.“

„Sekulární mysl se zdá mnohem lépe připravená na vytváření rozumných úsudků.“

„A teď, když vstupoval do závěrečných fází svého aktivního života, začínal chápat, že pokud nedojde k nějaké nepředvídané souhře okolností, jeho život se nezmění. Byl oklamán. Odjakživa se domníval, že v jeho dospělosti jednou nastane čas jakéhosi stabilizovaného stavu, kdy se naučí využívat veškeré triky, jak řídit svůj život nebo jen jednoduše žít. Kdy vyřídí veškerou poštu a e-maily, všechny papíry bude mít v pořádku, knihy vyrovnané na policích podle abecedy, oblečení a boty v dobrém stavu v šatnících a v botníku, všechny věci na svých místech, kde je bude umět najít, Svou minulost včetně dopisů a fotografií roztříděnou v krabicích a šanonech, soukromý život usazený a poklidný, stejně jako bydlení a peníze. Za celé ty roky nikdy k žádnému podobnému urovnání nedošlo, stabilizovaného stavu nikdy nedosáhl, ale přesto nadále předpokládal, aniž by nad stavem věcí uvažoval, že je už na dosah chvíle, kdy po vynaloženém úsilí kýženého stavu dosáhne, že nastane okamžik, kdy jeho život bude přehledný a duše svobodná, a jeho dospělá existence bude moct náležitě začít. Ale nedlouho po narození Catriony, přibližně v době, kdy se seznámil s Darlene, se domníval, že situaci poprvé vidí v celé její nahotě: v den, kdy umře, bude mít na sobě ponožky, které nepůjdou do páru, v počítači bude mít hromadu nezodpovězených e-mailů a v brlohu, kterému říká domov, budou nadále košile s chybějícími manžetovými knoflíčky, selhávající světlo na chodbě, nezaplacené složenky, neuklizená půda, mrtvé mouchy, a kolem něho budou kamarádi čekající na odpověď a milenky, k nimž se nebude hlásit. Zapomnění, poslední slovo v uspořádání všech věcí, mu bude jedinou útěchou.“

“Nothing that can be, can come between me and the full prospect of my hopes.”

“If life was a dream, then dying must be the moment when you woke up. It was so simple it must be true. You died, the dream was over, you woke up. That's what people meant when they talked about going to heaven. It was like waking up.”

“The world should take note: not everything is getting worse.”

“Imagining what it is like to be someone other than yourself is at the core of our humanity. It is the essence of compassion and the beginning of morality”

“Finally, you had to measure yourself by other people - there really was nothing else. every now and then, quite unintentionally, someone taught you something about yourself.”

“I turned the pages so fast. And I suppose I was, in my mindless way, looking for a something, version of myself, a heroine I could slip inside as one might a pair of favourite shoes.”

“Who you get, and how it works out - there's so much luck involved, as well as the million branching consequences of your unconscious choice of mate, that no one and no amount of talking can untangle it if it turns out unhappily.”

“When anything can happen, everything matters.”

“… beauty, she had discovered occupied a narrow band. Ugliness, on the hand, had infinite variation.”

“He had never before felt so self-consciously young, nor experienced such appetite, such impatience for the story to begin.”

“Nothing was to be lost by beginning at the beginning…”

“But it was too interesting, too new, too flattering, too deeply comforting to resist, it was a liberation to be in love and say so, and she could only let herself go deeper.”

“It is shaming sometimes how the body will not, or cannot, lie about emotions. Who, for decorum’s sake, has ever slowed his heart, or muted a blush?”

“Is there any meaning in my life that the inevitable death awaiting me does not destory?”

“one could drown in irrelevance.”

“How can a novelist achieve atonement when with her absolute power of deciding outcomes, she is also god?”

“A story lives transformed by a gesture not made or a word not spoken”

“Let his name be cleared and everyone else adjust their thinking. He had put in time, now they must do the work. His business was simple. Find Cecilia and love her, marry her and live without shame.”

“It wasn't torpor that kept her - she was often restless to the point of irritability. She simply liked to feel that she was prevented from leaving, that she was needed.”

“Love doesn't grow at a steady rate, but advances in surges, bolts, wild leaps, and this was one of those.”

“When they kissed she immediately felt his tongue, tensed and strong, pushing past her teeth, like some bully shouldering his way into a room. Entering her.”

“She returned his gaze, struck by the sense of her own transformation, and overwhelmed by the beauty which a lifetime havit had taught her to ignore.”

“She would simply wait on the bridge, calm and obstinate, until events, real events, not her own fantasies, roe to her challenge, and dispelled her insignificance.”

“When there are no consequences, being wrong is simply a diversion.”

“In that shrinking moment he discovered that he had never hated anyone until now. It was a feeling as pure as love, but dispassionate and icily rational.”

“The luxury of being half-asleep, exploring the fringes of psychosis in safety.”

“We go on our hands and knees and crawl our way towards the truth”

“Above all, she wanted to look as though she had not given the matter a moment's thought, and that would take time.”

“However, withered, I still feel myself to be exactly the same person I've always been. Hard to explain that to the young. we may look truly reptilian, but we're not a separate tribe.”