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Julian Barnes

Read through the most famous quotes from Julian Barnes




Books say: She did this because. Life says: She did this. Books are where things are explained to you; life is where things aren't. I'm not surprised some people prefer books.


— Julian Barnes


#life #life

To be stupid, and selfish, and to have good health are the three requirements for happiness - though if stupidity is lacking, the others are useless.


— Julian Barnes


#stupidity #stupidity

Women scheme when they are weak, they lie out of fear. Men scheme when they are strong, they lie out of arrogance.


— Julian Barnes


#fear #men #women #men

History is that certainty produced at the point where the imperfections of memory meet the inadequacies of documentation.


— Julian Barnes


#memory

What you end up remembering isn't always the same as what you have witnessed.


— Julian Barnes


#nostalgia #wit

The writer must be universal in sympathy and an outcast by nature: only then can he see clearly.


— Julian Barnes


#writers #writing #nature

A pier is a disappointed bridge.


— Julian Barnes


#disappointment

History isn't the lies of the victors, as I once glibly assured Old Joe Hunt; I know that now. It's more the memories of the survivors, most of whom are neither victorious or defeated.


— Julian Barnes


#time #defeat

One of the troubles is this: the heart isn't heart-shaped.


— Julian Barnes


#love

When you read a great book, you don't escape from life, you plunge deeper into it.


— Julian Barnes


#reading #life






About Julian Barnes






Did you know about Julian Barnes?

Forster Award from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters
1981 Somerset Maugham Award


List of works
Novels
Metroland (1980)
Before She Met Me (1982)
Flaubert's Parrot (1984) – shortlisted for the Booker Prize
Staring at the Sun (1986)
A History of the World in 10½ Chapters (1989)
Talking It Over (1991)
The Porcupine (1992)
England England (1998) – shortlisted for the Booker Prize
Love etc (2000) – sequel to Talking it Over
Arthur & George (2005) – shortlisted for the Booker Prize
The Sense of an Ending (2011) – winner of the Booker Prize
Collections and non-fiction
Letters from London (Picador London 1995) – journalism from The New Yorker ISBN 0-330-34116-2
Cross Channel (1996) – stories
Something to Declare (2002) – essays
The Pedant in the Kitchen (2003) – journalism on cooking
The Lemon Table (2004) – stories
Nothing to Be Frightened Of (2008) – memoir
Pulse (2011) – stories
Through the Window (2012) – essays
Works as Dan Kavanagh
Duffy (1980)
Fiddle City (1981)
Putting the Boot In (1985)
Going to the Dogs (1987)


Further reading
Peter Childs Julian Barnes (Contemporary British Novelists) Manchester University Press (2011)
Sebastian Groes & Peter Childs eds. At the age of 10 Barnes was told by his mother that he had "too much imagination". England England is a humorous novel that explores the idea of national identity as the entrepreneur Sir Jack Pitman creates a theme park on the Isle of Wight that duplicates the tourist spots of England.

Julian Patrick Barnes (born 19 January 1946) is a contemporary English writer. Barnes has also won several literary prizes in France including the Prix Médicis for Flaubert's Parrot and the Prix Femina for Talking It Over.

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