Translation is not a matter of words only: it is a matter of making intelligible a whole culture.
Anthony BurgessRead
It may not be nice to be good, little 6655321. It may be horrible to be good. And when I say that to you I realize how self-contradictory that sounds. I know I shall have many sleepless nights about this. What does God want? Does God want goodness or the choice of goodness? Is a man who chooses the bad perhaps in some way better than a man who has the good imposed upon him? Deep and hard questions, little 6655321.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote explores the complexity of goodness and the moral choices individuals face.
In this quote, Anthony Burgess delves into the intricate nature of morality, questioning whether true goodness stems from an individual's free choice or is merely a result of external expectations. He suggests that the struggle between choosing good and bad is inherently tied to one's moral character, provoking profound thoughts about the essence of goodness and whether it's more virtuous to choose goodness freely than to have it imposed upon oneself.
Themes
MoralityChoiceGoodnessPhilosophySelf-Reflection
In practice
Example use cases
In a philosophical debate about morality and choices.
More from Anthony Burgess
All quotes →There is a satisfactory boniness about grammar which the flesh of sheer vocabulary requires before it can become a vertebrate and walk the earth.
Anthony BurgessRead
There was me, that is Alex, and my three droogs, that is Pete, Georgie and Dim, Dim being really dim, and we sat in the Korova Milkbar making up our rassoodocks what to do with the evening.
Anthony BurgessRead
Violence among young people is an aspect of their desire to create. They don't know how to use their energy creatively so they do the opposite and destroy.
Anthony BurgessRead
Only in England is the perversion of language regarded as a victory for democracy.
Anthony BurgessRead
You needn't take it any further, sir. You've proved to me that all this ultraviolence and killing is wrong, wrong, and terribly wrong. I've learned me lesson, sir. I've seen now what I've never seen before. I'm cured! Praise Bog! I'm cured!
Anthony BurgessRead
Similar quotes
One thing was certain, that the white kitten had had nothing to do with it-- it was the black kitten's fault entirely.
Lewis CarrollRead
Religious faith not only lacks evidence, its independence from evidence is its pride and joy, shouted from the rooftops.
Richard DawkinsRead
I have long since passed that period when I felt personal discomfort at the sight of an ill-dressed or illiterate Negro. Social awareness has taught me where to lay the blame.
Lorraine HansberryRead
The good man's past begins to change so that his forgiven sins and remembered sorrows take on the quality of Heaven.
C. S. LewisRead
None but a good man is really a living man, and the more good any man does, the more he really lives. All the rest is death, or belongs to it.
Herman MelvilleRead
We should not say that one man's hour is worth another man's hour, but rather that one man during an hour is worth just as much as another man during an hour. Time is everything, man is nothing: he is at the most time's carcass.
Karl MarxRead