Existential solitude

Explore 11 quotes about Existential solitude

We are all travellers in what John Bunyan calls the wilderness of this world....and the best that we find in our travels is an honest friend.

Robert Louis Stevenson

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Topic

Friends Existential solitude Travel

Author

Robert Louis Stevenson

Source

Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes

Genre

Autobiography and memoir Travel writing

Language

English

Time

1879 1870s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Stevenson, Robert Louis. Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes. Boston: Roberts Brothers, 1879.

Current Citation

Stevenson, Robert Louis. Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes. Dover Publications, 2019.

The bonds between ourselves and another person exist only in our minds. Memory as it grows fainter loosens them, and notwithstanding the illusion by which we want to be duped and which, out of love, friendship, politeness, deference, duty, we dupe other people, we exist alone. Man is the creature who cannot escape from himself, who knows other people only in himself, and when he asserts the contrary, he is lying.

Marcel Proust

In Search of Lost Time

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Topic

Existential solitude Connecting with others Isolation The human condition

Author

Marcel Proust

Source

The Fugitive In Search of Lost Time

Medium

Novel

Genre

Modernist literature

Language

French

Time

1922 1920s 20th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Proust, Marcel. Albertine disparue [Albertine Gone]. Paris: Gallimard, 1927.

Current Citation

Proust, Marcel. The Fugitive, edited and translated by Peter Collier. Penguin Classics, 2021.

Who knows what true loneliness is—not the conventional word, but the naked terror? To the lonely themselves it wears a mask. The most miserable outcast hugs some memory or some illusion. Now and then a fatal conjunction of events may lift the veil for an instant. For an instant only. No human being could bear a steady view of moral solitude without going mad.

Joseph Conrad

Under Western Eyes

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Topic

Existential solitude Loneliness

Author

Joseph Conrad

Source

Under Western Eyes

Medium

Novel

Language

English

Time

1911 1910s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Conrad, Joseph. Under Western Eyes. Harper & Brothers/Methuen Publishing, 1911, pt. 1, ch. 2.

Current Citation

Conrad, Joseph. Under Western Eyes. Dover Publications, 2003, pt. 1, ch. 2.

Which of us has known his brother? Which of us has looked into his father's heart? Which of us has not remained forever prison-pent? Which of us is not forever a stranger and alone?

Thomas Wolfe

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Topic

Existential solitude

Author

Thomas Wolfe

Source

Look Homeward, Angel

Medium

Novel

Genre

Coming of age

Language

English

Time

1929 1920s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Wolfe, Thomas. Look Homeward, Angel: A Story of the Buried Life. Charles Scribner's Sons, 1929, foreword.

We're all of us sentenced to solitary confinement inside our own skins, for life.

Tennessee Williams

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Topic

Existential solitude

Speaker

Valentine Xavier

Author

Tennessee Williams

Source

Orpheus Descending

Medium

Play

Language

English

Time

1957 1950s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Williams, Tennessee. Orpheus Descending. Directed by Harold Clurman. Performed by Elizabeth Eustis and Jane Rose and Warren Kemmerling. 17 Mar. 1957, Martin Beck Theatre, New York City, New York, USA, act 2, sc. 1.

Current Citation

Williams, Tennessee. "Orpheus Descending." Orpheus Descending and Suddenly Last Summer. New Directions, 2012, act 2, sc. 1.

A wonderful fact to reflect upon, that every human creature is constituted to be that profound secret and mystery to every other.

Charles Dickens

A Tale of Two Cities

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Read A Tale of Two Cities at Project Gutenberg

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Topic

Existential solitude

Author

Charles Dickens

Source

A Tale of Two Cities

Medium

Novel

Genre

Historical literature

Language

English

Time

1859 1850s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Dickens, Charles. "A Tale of Two Cities." London: Chapman & Hall. April-Nov. 1859. Weekly serial.

Current Citation

Dickens, Charles. A Tale of Two Cities, edited by Robert Douglas-Fairhurst. W. W. Norton & Company, 2019, bk. 1, ch. 3.

We shall die alone.

Blaise Pascal

Pensées

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Read Pensees at Project Gutenberg

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Topic

Existential solitude Solitude Death

Author

Blaise Pascal

Source

Pensées

Medium

Epigram

Genre

Philosophical literature

Language

French

Time

1662 1660s 17th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Pascal, Blaise. Pensées [Thoughts]. Paris: Chez G. Desprez, 1670, no. 211.

Current Citation

Pascal, Blaise. "Pensées." Pensées and Other Writings, edited by Anthony Levi, translated by Honor Levi. Oxford University Press, 2008, no. 211.

What other dungeon is so dark as one's own heart!
What jailer so inexorable as one's self!

Nathaniel Hawthorne

The House of Seven Gables

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Topic

Existential solitude Inner life Self-criticism

Author

Nathaniel Hawthorne

Source

The House of Seven Gables

Medium

Novel

Language

English

Time

1851 1850s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The House of the Seven Gables: A Romance. Boston: Ticknor, Reed, and Fields, 1851, ch. 11.

Current Citation

Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The House of the Seven Gables, edited by Robert S. Levine. W. W. Norton & Company, 2020, ch. 11.

My heart is a lonely hunter that hunts on a lonely hill.

William Sharp

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Topic

Existential solitude

Author

William Sharp

Source

The Lonely Hunter

Medium

Poem

Language

English

Time

1896 1890s 19th century

Authentication Score 1

Citation

Sharp, William [published as Fiona McLeod]. "The Lonely Hunter." From the Hills of Dream. Edinburgh: Patrick Geddes & Colleagues, 1896.

Most people are on the world, not in it—have no conscious sympathy or relationship to anything about them—undiffused, separate, and rigidly alone like marbles of polished stone, touching but separate.

John Muir

More information about this quote

Topic

Alienation Existential solitude

Author

John Muir

Medium

Personal journal

Language

English

Time

1890 1890s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Muir, John. Journal entry. July 1890.

No human being can really understand another and no one can arrange another's happiness.

Graham Greene

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Topic

Existential solitude Empathy

Author

Graham Greene

Source

The Heart of the Matter

Medium

Novel

Language

English

Time

1948 1940s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Greene, Graham. The Heart of the Matter. William Heinemann/The Viking Press, 1948, bk. 1, pt. 3, ch. 1, sec. 1.