Insecurity twists meanings and poisons trust. In a closely beleaguered city every sentry is a potential traitor.
Graham GreeneRead
Sentimentality - that's what we call the sentiment we don't share.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Sentimentality refers to emotions or feelings that one keeps private or does not express openly.
Graham Greene's quote discusses the concept of sentimentality as an emotion that exists within individuals but is not shared or communicated to others. This suggests that certain feelings can be profound and meaningful yet remain unexpressed, leading to a distinction between what one might feel deeply and what one is willing to reveal, highlighting the complexity of human emotions and social interactions.
Themes
SentimentalityEmotionsFeelingsExpressionCommunication
In practice
Example use cases
This quote could be referenced in a speech about emotional vulnerability.
More from Graham Greene
All quotes →It seemed to Scobie that life was immeasurably long. Couldn’t the test of man have been carried out in fewer years? Couldn’t we have committed our first major sin at seven, have ruined ourselves for love or hate at ten, have clutched at redemption on a fifteen-year-old deathbed?
Graham GreeneRead
God is love. I don't say the heart doesn't feel a taste of it, but what a taste. The smallest glass of love mixed with a pint pot of ditch-water. We wouldn't recognize that love. It might even look like hate. It would be enough to scare us - God's love.
Graham GreeneRead
Of two hearts one is always warm and one is always cold: the cold heart is more precious than diamonds: the warm heart has no value and is thrown away.
Graham GreeneRead
Writing is a form of therapy; sometimes I wonder how all those who do not write, compose or paint can manage to escape the madness, melancholia, the panic and fear which is inherent in a human situation.
Graham GreeneRead
Champagne, if you are seeking the truth, is better than a lie detector. It encourages a man to be expansive, even reckless, while lie detectors are only a challenge to tell lies successfully.
Graham GreeneRead
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