Jean Rhys Quotes

Quotes about:

• I would never be part of anything. I would never really belong anywhere, and I knew it, and all my life would be the same, trying to belong, and failing. Always something would go wrong. I am a stranger and I always will be, and after all I didn’t really care.

  Jean Rhys

  Life, Being Yourself, I Dont Care

  65 Copy quote

• My life, which seems so simple and monotonous, is really a complicated affair of cafés where they like me and cafés where they don't, streets that are friendly, streets that aren't, rooms where I might be happy, rooms where I shall never be, looking-glasses I look nice in, looking-glasses I don't, dresses that will be lucky, dresses that won't, and so on.

  Jean Rhys

  Nice, Simple, Glasses

  34 Copy quote

• All of writing is a huge lake. There are great rivers that feed the lake, like Tolstoy or Dostoyevsky. And then there are mere trickles, like Jean Rhys. All that matters is feeding the lake. I don't matter. The lake matters. You must keep feeding the lake.

  Jean Rhys

  Writing, Lakes, Rivers

  32 Copy quote

• Now I no longer wish to be loved, beautiful, happy or successful. I want one thing and one thing only - to be left alone.

  Jean Rhys

  Beautiful, Successful, Wish

  18 Copy quote

• You can pretend for a long time, but one day it all falls away and you are alone. We are alone in the most beautiful place in the world.

  Jean Rhys

  Beautiful, Fall, Long

  Jean Rhys (2001). “Wide Sargasso Sea”, Gardners Books

  22 Copy quote

• A room is, after all, a place where you hide from the wolves. That's all any room is.

  Jean Rhys

  Rooms

  25 Copy quote

• I am the only real truth I know.

  Jean Rhys

  Truth, Real, Acceptance

  Jean Rhys, Isak Dinesen (1978). “Women Fiction 2”

  20 Copy quote

• The feeling of Sunday is the same everywhere, heavy, melancholy, standing still.

  Jean Rhys

  Friday, Sunday, Weekend

  Voyage in the Dark (1934) ch. 4, pt. 1

  23 Copy quote

• Only the magic and the dream are true — all the rest's a lie.

  Jean Rhys

  Dream, Lying, Magic

  Jean Rhys (2001). “Wide Sargasso Sea”, Gardners Books

  7 Copy quote

• When you are a child you are yourself and you know and see everything prophetically. And then suddenly something happens and you stop being yourself; you become what others force you to be. You lose your wisdom and your soul.

  Jean Rhys

  Being Yourself, Children, Soul

  Jean Rhys (1985). “Tales of the wide Caribbean”, Heinemann Educational Publishers

  9 Copy quote

• Have all beautiful things sad destinies?

  Jean Rhys

  Beautiful, Destiny, Beautiful Things

  Jean Rhys (1966). “Wide Sargasso Sea”

  9 Copy quote

• I think that the desire to be cruel and to hurt (with words because any other way might be dangerous to ourself) is part of human nature. Parties are battles (most parties), a conversation is a duel (often). Everybody's trying to hurt first, to get in the dig that will make him or her feel superior, feel triumph.

  Jean Rhys

  Hurt, Party, Thinking

  Jean Rhys, Francis Wyndham, Diana Melly (1984). “The letters of Jean Rhys”, Viking Adult

  16 Copy quote

• There is always the other side, always.

  Jean Rhys

  Sides

  Jean Rhys (2001). “Wide Sargasso Sea”, Gardners Books

  4 Copy quote

• I've been so ridiculous all my life that a little bit more or a little bit less hardly matters now.

  Jean Rhys

  Littles, Matter, Ridiculous

  18 Copy quote

• Life if curious when reduced to its essentials

  Jean Rhys

  Essentials, Curious, Ifs

  3 Copy quote

• I must write. If I stop writing my life will have been an abject failure. It is that already to other people. But it could be an abject failure to myself. I will not have earned death.

  Jean Rhys

  Writing, People, Has Beens

  Jean Rhys (1985). “Tales of the wide Caribbean”, Heinemann Educational Publishers

  10 Copy quote

• After all this, what happened? What happened was that, as soon as I had the slightest chance of a place to hide in, I crept into it and hid. Well, sometimes it's a fine day isn't it? Sometimes the skies are blue. Sometimes the air is light, easy to breathe. And there is always tomorrow.

  Jean Rhys

  Light, Air, Blue

  8 Copy quote

• We can't all be happy, we can't all be rich, we can't all be lucky - and it would be so much less fun if we were... There must be the dark background to show up the bright colours.

  Jean Rhys

  Life, Fun, Dark

  14 Copy quote

• I hated the mountains and the hills, the rivers and the rain. I hated the sunsets of whatever colour, I hated its beauty and its magic and the secret I would never know. I hated its indifference and the cruelty which was part of its loveliness. Above all I hated her. For she belonged to the magic and the loveliness. She had left me thirsty and all my life would be thirst and longing for what I had lost before I found it.

  Jean Rhys

  Rain, Sunset, Rivers

  12 Copy quote

• I want more of this feeling - fire and wings.

  Jean Rhys

  Fire, Wings, Feelings

  2 Copy quote

• Today I must be very careful, today I have left my armor at home.

  Jean Rhys

  Home, Today, Armor

  11 Copy quote

• The last time you were happy about nothing; the first time you were afraid about nothing. Which came first?

  Jean Rhys

  Lasts, Firsts, First Time

  5 Copy quote

• ...I know all about myself now, I know. You've told me so often. You haven't left me one rag of illusion to clothe myself in.

  Jean Rhys

  Rags, Illusion, Havens

  6 Copy quote

• Age seldom arrives smoothly or quickly. It's more often a succession of jerks.

  Jean Rhys

  Age, Aging, Jerk

  Jean Rhys (1975). “My Day: Three Pieces”

  12 Copy quote

• I am sad, sad as a circus-lioness.

  Jean Rhys

  Lioness, Circus

  21 Copy quote

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