“Was this their exact exchange? Almost certainly not. Still, it is my best memory of their exchange.” — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
History is that certainty produced at the point where the imperfections of memory meet the inadequacies of documentation. — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
What you end up remembering isn't always the same as what you have witnessed. — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
“But I don't remember. I won't remember. Memory is an act of will, and so is forgetting.” — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
“This [...] isn't something I actually saw, but what you end up remembering isn't always the same as what you witnessed.” — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
Remember the botched brothel-visit in L’Education sentimentale and remember its lesson. Do not participate: happiness lies in the imagination, not the act.… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
“And yet it takes only the smallest pleasure or pain to teach us of time's malleability. Some emotions speed it up, others… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
Memory is identity…You are what you have done; what you have done is in your memory; what you remember defines who you… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
“Memory is identity. I have believed this since – oh, since I can remember. You are what you have done; what you… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
When you are in your twenties, even if you're confused and uncertain about your aims and purposes, you have a strong sense… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
“I blushed. You haven't seen a bald man in his sixties blush? Oh, it happens, just as it does to a hairy,… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
“Who was it said that memory is what we thought we'd forgotten? And it ought to be obvious to us that time… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
“For the point is this: not that myth refers us back to some original event which has been fancifully transcribed as it… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
We live with such easy assumptions, don't we? For instance, that memory equals events plus time. But it's all much odder than… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
“When you are in your twenties, even if you're confused and uncertain about your aims and purposes, you have a strong sense… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
“Also, when you are young, you think you can predict the likely pains and bleaknesses that age might bring. You imagine yourself… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
“When you are in your twenties, even if you're confused and uncertain about your aims and purposes, you have a strong sense… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
“If a memory wasn't a thing but a memory of a memory of a memory, mirrors set in parallel, then what the… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
“I know this much: that there is objective time, but also subjective time, the kind you wear on the inside of your… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
What is history? Any thoughts, Webster?' 'History is the lies of the victors,' I replied, a little too quickly. 'Yes, I was… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
“You put together two things that have not been put together before. And the world is changed. People may not notice at the time,… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
“I settled into a contented routine of working, spending my free time with Veronica and, back in my student room, wanking explosively to fantasies… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
The greatest patriotism is to tell your country when it is behaving dishonorably, foolishly, viciously. — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
“There is only good vodka and very good vodka—there is no such thing as bad vodka.” — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
Alice Munro can move characters through time in a way that no other writer can. — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
How rarely do our emotions meet the object they seem to deserve? How hopelessly we signal; how dark the sky; how big the waves.… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
You put together two people who have not been put together before. Sometimes it is like that first attempt to harness a hydrogen balloon… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
“Also, when you are young, you think you can predict the likely pains and bleaknesses that age might bring. You imagine yourself being lonely,… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
“Why slum it where people were burdened by yesterday, and the day before, and the day before that? By history? Here, on the Island,… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
“In those years before mobile phones, email and Skype, travelers depended on the rudimentary communications system known as the postcard. Other methods--the long-distance phone… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
“My train was late, slowed by the usual Sunday engineering work. I got home in the early evening. I remember that I had a… — Julian Barnes Copy Share Image
![“This [...] isn't something I actually saw, but what you end up remembering isn't always the same as what you witnessed.” quote by Julian Barnes](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/1a3/julian-barnes-522_memory_this-isn-t-something-i-actually-saw-but_373620.jpg)
![“Who was it said that memory is what we thought we'd forgotten? And it ought to be obvious to us that time doesn't act as a fixative, rather as a solvent. But it's not convenient--it's not useful--to believe this; it doesn't help us get on with our lives; so we ignore it. [p. 69]” quote by Julian Barnes](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/90c/julian-barnes-522_life_who-was-it-said-that-memory-is-what-we-t_368829.jpg)
