At the back of my mind I had a sense of us sitting about waiting for some terrible event, and then I would remember that it had already happened.
Interpretation
The quote reflects on the anticipation of a future disaster while acknowledging that the worst has already occurred.
This quote by Ian McEwan delves into the psychological state of living in dread of future misfortunes, suggesting that this anxiety can be rooted in past trauma. It highlights an individual's struggle with the weight of prior experiences, leading to a perpetual state of waiting for calamity, although the true catastrophe may have already been faced, emphasizing the complexity of human emotion and memory.
In practice
In a speech about resilience, one could use this quote to illustrate how past experiences shape our fears and perceptions of the future.
Watching him during the first several minutes of his delivery, Cecilia felt a pleasant sinking sensation in her stomach as she contemplated how deliciously self-destructive it would be, almost erotic, to be married to a man so nearly handsome, so hugely rich, so unfathomably stupid. He would fill her with his big-faced children, all of them loud, boneheaded boys with a passion for guns and football and aeroplanes.
My needs were simple I didn't bother much with themes or felicitous phrases and skipped fine descriptions of weather, landscapes and interiors. I wanted characters I could believe in, and I wanted to be made curious about what was to happen to them. Generally, I preferred people to be falling in and out of love, but I didn't mind so much if they tried their hand at something else. It was vulgar to want it, but I liked someone to say 'Marry me' by the end.
It marked the beginning and, of course, an end. At that moment a chapter, no, a whole stage of my closed. Had I known, and had there been a spare second or two, I might have allowed myself a little nostalgia.
There are ways in which art can have a longer reach than politics.
And now she was back in the world, not one she could make, but the one that had made her, and she felt herself shrinking under the early evening sky. She was weary of being outdoors, but she was not ready to go in. Was that really all there was in life, indoors or out? Wasn't there somewhere else for people to go?
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 it is the beginning of morality.
Man is subject to innumerable pains and sorrows by the very condition of humanity, and yet, as if nature had not sown evils enough in life, we are continually adding grief to grief and aggravating the common calamity by our cruel treatment of one another.
Yours is not the task of making your way in the world, but the task of remaking the world which you will find before you.
There is only one cure for the evils which newly acquired freedom produces, and that cure is freedom.
This wasn't the sea of the inexorable horizon and smashing waves, not the sea of distance and violence, but the sea of the etenally leveling patience and wetness of water. Whether it comes to you in a storm or in a cup, it owns you--we are more water than dust. It is our origin and our destination.
Any young man who is unmarried at the age of twenty one is a menace to the community.
I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism.
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