Nostalgia Quotes

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  Every act of rebellion expresses a nostalgia for innocence and an appeal to the essence of being.

  Albert Camus

  Essence, Innocence, Rebellion

  Albert Camus (2012). “The Rebel: An Essay on Man in Revolt”, p.105, Vintage

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  We are torn between nostalgia for the familiar and an urge for the foreign and strange. As often as not, we are homesick most for the places we have never known.

  Carson McCullers

  Travel, Jukebox, Road Trip

  Carson McCullers (2017). “Carson McCullers: Stories, Plays & Other Writings”, p.408, Library of America

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  Nostalgia, the vice of the aged. We watch so many old movies our memories come in monochrome.

  Angela Carter

  Memories, Vices, Watches

  Angela Carter (2012). “Wise Children”, p.10, Random House

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  We are homesick most for the places we have never known.

  Carson McCullers

  Jukebox, Homesick, Heart Is A Lonely Hunter

  Carson McCullers (2017). “Carson McCullers: Stories, Plays & Other Writings”, p.408, Library of America

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• Nostalgia is a file that removes the rough edges from the good old days.

  Doug Larson

  Time, Rough Edges, Homecoming

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• Remembrance of things past.

  William Shakespeare

  Past, Remembrance, Things Past

  Sonnet 30

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• We seem to be going through a period of nostalgia, and everyone seems to think yesterday was better than today. I don't think it was, and I would advise you not to wait ten years before admitting today was great. If you're hung up on nostalgia, pretend today is yesterday and just go out and have one hell of a time.

  Art Buchwald

  Past, Thinking, Years

  43 Copy quote

• The 'good old times' - all times when old are good.

  Lord Byron

  Literature, Old Time, All Time

  "The Age of Bronze" st. 1 (1823)

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• Distance not only gives nostalgia, but perspective, and maybe objectivity.

  Robert Morgan

  Distance, Objectivity, Giving

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• It becomes increasingly easy, as you get older, to drown in nostalgia.

  Ted Koppel

  Scrapbooking, Easy

  20 Copy quote

• There are a few moments in your life when you are truly and completely happy, and you remember to give thanks. Even as it happens you are nostalgic for the moment, you are tucking it away in your scrapbook.

  David Benioff

  Giving, Thanks, Remember

  David Benioff (2005). “When the Nines Roll Over: And Other Stories”, p.73, Penguin

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• We could never have loved the earth so well if we had had no childhood in it.

  George Eliot

  Children, Childhood, Earth

  George Eliot (2012). “The Mill on the Floss”, p.30, Courier Corporation

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• Nostalgia is not what it used to be.

  Simone Signoret

  Used, Used To Be

  "Fictional character: Hector". "Hector and the Search for Happiness", www.imdb.com. 2014.

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• These fragments I have shored against my ruins

  T. S. Eliot

  Age, Ruins, Aging

  The Waste Land l. 431 (1922)

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• You can't have a better tomorrow if
  you are thinking about yesterday all the time.

  Charles Kettering

  Letting Go, Time, Attitude

  Charles Franklin Kettering (1961). “Prophet of progress: selections from the speeches of Charles F. Kettering”

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• If you're hung up on nostalgia, pretend today is yesterday and just go out and have one hell of a time.

  Art Buchwald

  Sadness, Yesterday, Live In The Moment

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• A feeling of sadness and longing, That is not akin to pain, And resembles sorrow only As the mist resembles the rain.

  Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

  Pain, Rain, Sadness

  Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1988). “Selected Poems”, p.302, Penguin

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• Nostalgia is a seductive liar.

  George Ball

  Liars, Lying, Past

  Newsweek, 1971.

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• In the sunset of dissolution, everything is illuminated by the aura of nostalgia, even the guillotine.

  Milan Kundera

  Sunset, Auras, Unbearable

  "The Unbearable Lightness of Being", 1988.

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• Imagination is nostalgia for the past, the absent it is the liquid solution in which art develops the snapshot of reality.

  Cyril Connolly

  Art, Past, Reality

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• There's a certain nostalgia and romance in a place you left.

  David Guterson

  Romance, Certain, Left

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• Have you ever wondered how nostalgia isn"t what it used to be?

  Jasper Fforde

  Used, Used To Be

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• How often have I lain beneath rain on a strange roof, thinking of home.

  William Faulkner

  Rain, Home, Thinking

  William Faulkner (1955). “Faulkner's county: tales of Yoknapatawpha county”

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• The times you lived through, the people you shared those times with — nothing brings it all to life like an old mix tape. It does a better job of storing up memories than actual brain tissue can do. Every mix tape tells a story. Put them together, and they can add up to the story of a life.

  Rob Sheffield

  Music, Jobs, Memories

  Rob Sheffield (2007). “Love Is a Mix Tape: Life, Loss, and What I Listened To”, p.26, Crown Archetype

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• The world is full of people whose notion of a satisfactory future is, in fact, a return to the idealized past.

  Robertson Davies

  Future, Past, People

  "A Voice from the Attic". Book by Robertson Davies, 1960.

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