J.G. Farrell

“if you were adventurous, scoop out the fragrant, heavenly, alarming flesh of the durian.”

— J.G. Farrell

“And everyone would climb the stairs chuckling to their rooms and dream of aces and knaves and a supply of trumps that…

— J.G. Farrell

“For Dupigny a nation resembled a very primitive human being: this human being consisted of, simply, an appetite and some sort of…

— J.G. Farrell

“For a day or two Fleury became quite active. He had his book about the advance of civilization in India to consider…

— J.G. Farrell

“What an advantage that knowledge can be stored in books! The knowledge lies there like hermetically sealed provisions waiting for the day…

— J.G. Farrell

“We look on past ages with condescension, as a mere preparation for us....but what if we are a mere after-glow of them?”

— J.G. Farrell

“It is distressing to have to act under the impulsive orders of someone who, in a situation which concerns you deeply, does…

— J.G. Farrell

“Surely there’s no need to abandon one’s reason simply because one is in Ireland.”

— J.G. Farrell

“Walter, overhearing this, frowned at Dupigny, not because he disbelieved this story, but to indicate that he should speak guardedly in front…

— J.G. Farrell

“It seems that’s there a ghastly Darwinian principle of economics known as the Law of Substitution which declares, more or less, that…

— J.G. Farrell

“Why do people insist on defending their ideas and opinions with such ferocity, as if defending honour itself? What could be easier…

— J.G. Farrell

“I read somewhere that the boatman who rowed King William back across the river after the Battle of the Boyne is supposed…

— J.G. Farrell

“explained that the Committee for International Understanding, with Europe crumbling about it, had closed down in 1940, naturally dismayed by the amount…

— J.G. Farrell