But it is the knowledge of how contingent my unease is, how dependent on a baby that wails beneath my window one day and does not wail the next, that brings the worst shame to me, the greatest indifference to annihilation. I know somewhat too much; and from this knowledge, once one has been infected, there seems to be no recovering. I ought never to have taken my lantern to see what was going on in the hut by the granary. On the other hand, there was no way, once I had picked up the lantern, for me to put it down again. The knot loops in upon itself; I cannot find the end.
I am not the we of anyone - J. M. Coetzee
I am not the we of anyone
- J. M. Coetzee
A book should be an axe to chop open the frozen sea inside us. - J. M. Coetzee
A book should be an axe to chop open the frozen sea inside us.
Truth is not spoken in anger. Truth is spoken, if it ever comes to be spoken, in love. The gaze of love is not deluded. It sees what is best in the b… - J. M. Coetzee
Truth is not spoken in anger. Truth is spoken, if it ever comes to be spoken, in love. The gaze of love is not deluded. It sees what is best in the b…
(I)f we are going to be kind, let it be out of simple generosity, not because we fear guilt or retribution. - J. M. Coetzee
(I)f we are going to be kind, let it be out of simple generosity, not because we fear guilt or retribution.
When all else fails, philosophize. - J. M. Coetzee
When all else fails, philosophize.
Our lies reveal as much about us as our truths - J. M. Coetzee
Our lies reveal as much about us as our truths
Let me say it openly: we are surrounded by an enterprise of degradation, cruelty, and killing which rivals anything the Third Reich was capable of, i… - J. M. Coetzee
Let me say it openly: we are surrounded by an enterprise of degradation, cruelty, and killing which rivals anything the Third Reich was capable of, i…
We must cultivate, all of us, a certain ignorance, a certain blindness, or society will not be tolerable. - J. M. Coetzee
We must cultivate, all of us, a certain ignorance, a certain blindness, or society will not be tolerable.
There seemed nothing to do but live. - J. M. Coetzee
There seemed nothing to do but live.
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