QuoteProject
Only enemies speak the truth; friends and lovers lie endlessly, caught in the web of duty.
Stephen King
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

The quote suggests that enemies are more likely to tell the truth, while friends and lovers often hide the truth due to obligations.

In this quote, Stephen King highlights the complexity of interpersonal relationships, where the expectations of loyalty and duty can lead individuals to obscure the truth. Friends and lovers may lie to protect feelings or maintain harmony, while enemies, by contrast, have less to lose and often express unfiltered truths, revealing the paradox of honesty within close relationships.

Themes

TruthLyingRelationshipsFriendsEnemiesDuty

In practice

Example use cases

This quote can be used when discussing the nature of honesty in relationships during a casual conversation.

More from Stephen King

Try any goddam thing you like, no matter how boringly normal or outrageous. If it works, fine. If it doesn't, toss it. Toss it even if you love it.
Stephen KingRead
Eddie discovered one of his childhood's great truths. Grownups are the real monsters, he thought.
Stephen KingRead
Hairstyles change, and skirt lengths, and slang, but high school administrations? Never.
Stephen KingRead
Description begins in the writer’s imagination, but should finish in the reader’s.
Stephen KingRead
That's the day's business. Thinking. Thinking and isolation, because it doesn't matter if you pass the time of day with someone or not; in the end, you're alone. He seemed to have put in as many miles in his brain as he had with his feet. The thoughts kept coming and there was no way to deny them.
Stephen KingRead
Late last night and the night before, tommyknockers, tommyknockers knocking on my door. I wanna go out, don't know if I can 'cuz I'm so afraid of the tommyknocker man.
Stephen KingRead

Similar quotes

Marriage is an alliance entered into by a man who can't sleep with the window shut, and a woman who can't sleep with the window open.
George Bernard ShawRead
What our grandmothers told us about playing hard to get is true. The whole point of the game is to impress and capture. It's not about honesty. Many men and women, when they're playing the courtship game, deceive so they can win. Novelty, excitement and danger drive up dopamine in the brain. And both sexes brag.
Helen FisherRead
We invented marriage. Couples invented marriage. We also invented divorce,mind you. And we invented infidelity,too, as well as romantic misery. In fact we invented the whole sloppy mess of love and intimacy and aversion and euphoria and failure. But most importantly of all, most subversively of all, most stubbornly of all, we invented privacy.
Elizabeth GilbertRead
Having once embarked on your marital voyage, it is impossible not to be aware that you make no way and the sea is not within sight; that in fact, you are exploring an enclosed basin.
George EliotRead
I hold this to be the highest task for a bond between two people: that each protects the solitude of the other.
Rainer Maria RilkeRead
Can anyone understand how it is to have lived in the White House and then, suddenly, to be living alone as the President's widow?
Jackie KennedyRead

A little wisdom, now and then

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

Quote by Stephen King | QuoteProject