QuoteProject
I've been homesick for countries I've never been, and longed to be where I couldn't be.
John Cheever
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

The quote expresses a longing for places and experiences that are elusive or imaginary.

In this quote, John Cheever articulates a profound sense of yearning for the unfamiliar and unexperienced. It reflects on the human condition of desiring something beyond our reach, conveying the idea that our imagination often leads us to long for places and experiences that we have never encountered, revealing the complexities of home and belonging in our lives.

Themes

HomesicknessLongingImaginationTravelBelonging

In practice

Example use cases

This quote can be shared in a travel blog to express the feeling of wanderlust.

More from John Cheever

The deep joy we take in the company of people with whom we have just recently fallen in love is undisguisable.
John CheeverRead
For me a page of good prose is where one hears the rain. A page of good prose is when one hears the noise of battle.... A page of good prose seems to me the most serious dialogue that well-informed and intelligent men and women carry on today in their endeavor to make sure that the fires of this planet burn peaceably.
John CheeverRead
For me, a page of good prose is where one hears the rain and the noise of battle. It has the power to give grief or universality that lends it a youthful beauty.
John CheeverRead
The world that was not mine yesterday now lies spread out at my feet, a splendor. I seem, in the middle of the night, to have returned to the world of apples, the orchards of Heaven. Perhaps I should take my problems to a shrink, or perhaps I should enjoy the apples that I have, streaked with color like the evening sky.
John CheeverRead
What I am going to write is the last of what I have to say. I will say that literature is the only consciousness we possess and that its role as consciousness must inform us of our ability to comprehend the hideous danger of nuclear power.
John CheeverRead
Art is the triumph over chaos.
John CheeverRead

Similar quotes

The vital straining towards an ideal, definite but latent, when it dominates a whole life, may express that ideal more fully than could the best chosen words.
George SantayanaRead
Do we walk in legends or on the green earth in the daylight?' A man may do both,' said Aragorn. 'For not we but those who come after will make the legends of our time. The green earth, say you? That is a mighty matter of legend, though you tread it under the light of day!
J. R. R. TolkienRead
Civilizations come and go; they conquer the earth and crumble into dust; but faith survives every desolation.
Will DurantRead
I am not the editor of a newspaper and shall always try to do right and be good so that God will not make me one.
Mark TwainRead
The mob that hails the man on horseback, the Caesars and conquering heroes, does not retain its freedoms for long.
Sidney HookRead
All things human hang by a slender thread; and that which seemed to stand strong suddenly falls and sinks in ruins.
OvidRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.