Socrates told us, "the unexamined life is not worth living." I think he's calling for curiosity, more than knowledge. In every human society at all times and at all levels, the curious are at the leading edge.
Sometimes two people will regard each other over a gulf too wide to ever be bridged, and know immediately what could have happened, and that it never will.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote reflects on how some connections between people can be recognized but ultimately remain unfulfilled due to circumstances.
Roger Ebert's quote poignantly captures the bittersweet awareness that can exist between two individuals who recognize a profound bond that is never to be realized. Despite their mutual understanding and attraction, the barriers between them—whether emotional, situational, or societal—create an insurmountable gulf that renders their potential relationship nonexistent. This encapsulates the bittersweet nature of certain connections, where the realization of what could have been weighs heavily on the heart.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be shared during a reflective discussion on love and relationships at a gathering.
More from Roger Ebert
All quotes →Vincent Gallo has put a curse on my colon and a hex on my prostate. He called me a 'fat pig' in the New York Post and told the New York Observer I have 'the physique of a slave-trader.' He is angry at me because I said his 'The Brown Bunny' was the worst movie in the history of the Cannes Film Festival... _x000D_ it is true that I am fat, but one day I will be thin, and he will still be the director of 'The Brown Bunny.'
I was born inside the movie of my life. The visuals were before me, the audio surrounded me, the plot unfolded inevitably but not necessarily. I don't remember how I got into the movie, but it continues to entertain me.
Why do alcoholics begin down the same hazardous road day after day? They are in search of that elusive window of well-being that opens when you drink your way out of a hangover and aren't yet drunk all over again. The alcoholic's day consists of trying to keep that window open.
There are no guarantees. But there is also nothing to fear. We come from oblivion when we are born. We return to oblivion when we die. The astonishing thing is this period of in-between.
Parents and schools should place great emphasis on the idea that it is all right to be different. Racism and all the other 'isms' grow from primitive tribalism, the instinctive hostility against those of another tribe, race, religion, nationality, class or whatever. You are a lucky child if your parents taught you to accept diversity.
Similar quotes
Several times in my life I've gone through long periods without sex or any other kind of physical contact. The hunger it produces is deep and low; it's possible to lose track of it, to forget or fail to perceive how it's emptied everything out of you and made the world papery and thin. Touch starved, you brush against existence like a stick against dry leaves. You become insubstantial yourself, a hungry ghost.
The dupe of friendship, and the fool of love; have I not reason to hate and to despise myself? Indeed I do; and chiefly for not having hated and despised the world enough.
It is he who has broken the bond of marriage - not I. I only break its bondage.
In an age when the fashion is to be in love with yourself, confessing to be in love with somebody else is an admission of unfaithfulness to one's beloved.
In my own home, where I've been able to create an environment that works for me, I'm hardly disabled at all. I still have an impairment, and there are obviously some very restrictive things about that, but the impact of disability is less.
Those who are unhappy have no need for anything in this world but people capable of giving them their attention.