Insecurity twists meanings and poisons trust. In a closely beleaguered city every sentry is a potential traitor.
Graham GreeneRead
When he was young, he had thought love had something to do with understanding, but with age he knew that no human being understood another. Love was the wish to understand, and presently with constant failure the wish died, and love died too perhaps or changed into this painful affection, loyalty, pity.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Love involves a desire for understanding, but as we grow older, we realize true understanding between people is often unattainable.
In this quote, Graham Greene reflects on the evolution of one's understanding of love from youth to adulthood. Initially, he believed that love was rooted in mutual understanding between individuals, but through the experiences of life, he recognizes that such understanding is elusive. This realization leads to a transformation of love, which may fade or morph into feelings of loyalty, pity, or pain. Ultimately, Greene suggests that the essence of love is intertwined with the desire to understand, even if complete comprehension remains out of reach.
Themes
LoveUnderstandingHumanityRelationshipsPain
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech about the nature of love and relationships, one might use this quote to illustrate the complexities of affection.
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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