Trembling of the Branch

“An idea is like a rare bird which cannot be seen. What one sees is the trembling of the branch it has just left.”
― Lawrence Durrell

“History is an endless repetition of the wrong way of living”
― Lawrence Durrell

“Very few people realise that sex is a psychic and not a physical act. The clumsy coupling of human beings is simply a biological paraphrase of this truth - a primitive method of introducing minds to each other, engaging them. But most people are stuck in the physical aspect, unaware of the poetic rapport which it so clumsily tries to teach.”
― Lawrence Durrell, Balthazar

“Science is the poetry of the intellect and poetry the science of the heart's affections.”
― Lawrence Durrell, The Alexandria Quartet

“The heaviest impact of the work of art is in the guts. Art does not reason. It manhandles you and changes you...”
― Lawrence Durrell

“I had become, with the approach of night, once more aware of loneliness and time - those two companions without whom no journey can yield us anything.”
― Lawrence Durrell, Bitter Lemons of Cyprus

“We live" writes Pursewarden somewhere, "lives based upon selected fictions. Our view of reality is conditioned by our position in space and time - not by our personalities as we like to think. Thus every interpretation of reality is based upon a unique position. Two paces east or west and the whole picture is changed.”
― Lawrence Durrell, Balthazar

“Love is like trench warfare - you cannot see the enemy, but you know he is there and that it is wiser to keep your head down.”
― Lawrence Durrell, Balthazar