All Penelope Lively Quotes
- We all need a past - that's where our sense of identity comes from. All
- I didn't think I had anything particular to say, but I thought I might have something to say to children. Anything Particular
- I rather like getting away from fiction. Fiction
- I've always been fascinated by the operation of memory - the way in which it is not linear but fragmented, and its ambivalence. Ambivalence
- The present hardly exists, after all-it becomes the past even as it happens. A tricky medium, time - and central to the concerns of fiction. All
- There's a preoccupation with memory and the operation of memory and a rather rapacious interest in history. History
- You learn a lot, writing fiction. Fiction
- I can walk about London and see a society that seems an absolutely revolutionary change from the 1950s, that seems completely and utterly different, and… Absolutely
- I'm writing another novel and I know what I'm going to do after, which may be something more like this again, maybe some strange mixture… Another Novel
- I'm not an historian but I can get interested-obsessively interested-with any aspect of the past, whether it's palaeontology or archaeology or the very recent past. Any
- I can remember the lush spring excitement of language in childhood. Sitting in church, rolling it around my mouth like marbles--tabernacle and pharisee and parable,… Babylon
- We all act as hinges-fortuitous links between other people. Act
- Getting to know someone else involves curiosity about where they have come from, who they are. Curiosity
- I'm intrigued by the way in which physical appearance can often direct a person's life; things happen differently for a beautiful woman than for a… Appearance
- The pleasure of writing fiction is that you are always spotting some new approach, an alternative way of telling a story and manipulating characters; the… Alternative
- If we had not met, that day, I think I would have imagined you somehow. Day
- The place didn't look the same but it felt the same; sensations clutched and transformed me. I stood outside some concrete and plate-glass tower-block, picked… American
- It seems to me that anyone whose library consists of a Kindle lying on a table is some sort of bloodless nerd. Anyone
- Forever, reading has been central, the necessary fix, the support system. Her life has been informed by reading. She has read not just for distraction,… Been
- Language tethers us to the world; without it we spin like atoms. Atoms
- In old age, you realise that while you're divided from your youth by decades, you can close your eyes and summon it at will. As… Advantage
- We read Greek and Norse mythology until it came out of our ears. And the Bible. Bible
- Deep down I have this atavistic feeling that really I should be in the country. Atavistic
- I have long been interested in landscape history, and when younger and more robust I used to do much tramping of the English landscape in… Ancient
- Conventional forms of narrative allow for different points of view, but for this book I wanted a structure whereby each of the main characters contributed… Allow