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Authors:

Djuna Barnes quotes

American Novelist June 12, 1892 – June 18, 1982

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Quotes

God,' she cried, 'what is love? Man seeking his own head? The human head, so rented by misery that even the teeth weigh! She couldn't tell me the truth because she had never planned it; her life was a continual accident, and how can you prepare for that? Everything we can't bear in the world, some day we find in one person, and love it all at once.... There's something evil in me that loves evil and degradation--purty's black backside! That loves honesty with a horrid love; or why have I... Djuna Barnes
The heart of the jealous knows the best and most satisfying love, that of the other's bed, where the rival perfects the lover's imperfections. Djuna Barnes
Matthew,' she said, 'have you ever loved someone and it became yourself?' For a moment he did not answer. Taking up the decanter he held it to the light. 'Robin can go anywhere, do anything,' Nora continued, 'because she forgets, and I nowhere because I remember.' She came toward him. 'Matthew,' she said, 'you think I have always been like this. Once I was remorseless, but this is another love — it goes everywhere; there is no place for it to stop — it rots me away. Djuna Barnes
There's something evil in me that loves evil and degradation--purity's black backside! That loves honesty with a horrid love; or why have I always gone seeking it at the liar's door? Djuna Barnes
Djuna Barnes quote: "To love without criticism is to be betrayed."
To love without criticism is to be betrayed. Djuna Barnes
Djuna Barnes quote: "I tell you, Madame, if one gave birth to a heart on a plate,..."
I tell you, Madame, if one gave birth to a heart on a plate, it would say “Love” and twitch like the lopped leg of a frog. Djuna Barnes
Djuna Barnes quote: "I have been loved,' she said, 'by something strange, and it..."
I have been loved,' she said, 'by something strange, and it has forgotten me. Djuna Barnes
We are beginning to wonder whether a servant girl hasn't the best of it after all. She knows how the salad tastes without the dressing, and she knows how life's lived before it gets to the parlor door. Djuna Barnes
And once Father Lucas said to me, 'Be simple, Matthew, life is a simple book, and an open book, read and be simple as the beasts in the field; just being miserable isn't enough -- you've got to know how.' So I got to thinking and I said to myself, 'This is a terrible thing that Father Lucas has put on me -- be simple like the beasts and yet think and harm nobody. Djuna Barnes
Djuna Barnes quote: "Life is painful, nasty and short... in my case it has only..."
Life is painful, nasty and short... in my case it has only been painful and nasty. Djuna Barnes
Those who turn the day into night, the young, the drug addict, the profligate, the drunken and that most miserable, the lover who watches all night long in fear and anguish. These can never again live the life of the day. When one meets them at high noon they give off, as if it were a protective emanation, something dark and muted. The light does not become them any longer. They begin to have an unrecorded look. It is as if they were being tried by the continual blows of an unseen adversary. Djuna Barnes
Djuna Barnes quote: "For most people, life is nasty, brutish, and short; for me, it..."
For most people, life is nasty, brutish, and short; for me, it has simply been nasty and brutish. Djuna Barnes
The perfume that her body exhaled was of the quality of that earth-flesh, fungi, which smells of captured dampness and yet is so dry, overcast with the odour of oil of amber, which is an inner malady of the sea, making her seem as if she had invaded a sleep incautious and entire. Her flesh was the texture of plant life, and beneath it one sensed a frame, broad, porous and sleep-worn, as if sleep were a decay fishing her beneath the visible surface. About her head there was an effulgence as of... Djuna Barnes
Djuna Barnes quote: "Even the contemplative life is only an effort, Nora my dear,..."
Even the contemplative life is only an effort, Nora my dear, to hide the body so the feet won’t stick out. Djuna Barnes
Djuna Barnes quote: "We are adhering to life now with our last muscle - the heart."
We are adhering to life now with our last muscle - the heart. Djuna Barnes

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