A Closed Eye Quotes

“And I go to bed too early. I sometimes think I should never have married because I need too much sleep.”
― Anita Brookner, A Closed Eye

“Parents are only good as parents at a certain stage of their children’s lives, she reflected.”
― Anita Brookner, A Closed Eye

“She was not aware of loneliness so much as of endeavour: her future career as a writer, of which there was as yet no sign, would, she thought, in time validate her entire existence. Until then she would adopt—had already adopted—a regime which would steel her against rejection and disappointment.”
― Anita Brookner, A Closed Eye

“They sat in silence until it was time for her to go. ‘Go before he gets back,’ said her mother. They stood up, embraced. Merle was shockingly aware of her daughter’s changed appearance. ‘Poor child, poor child,’ she said. ‘But she was a young woman,’ protested Harriet. ‘A beautiful young woman.’ ‘No, dear,’ said her mother sadly. ‘I meant you.”
― Anita Brookner, A Closed Eye

“Thus everything had been false, everything except the birth of her daughter, which had freed her momentarily from frightened acquiescence, made her calm and strong, and a little more selfish, but not quite enough. Thus are lives lost, through what must be despair at knowing oneself too weak to deal with the dangers, the choices. And only the memory of those few brief moments of permitted freedom, in a café in New Burlington Street, a book on the table in front of her, with the clear conscience of one who had done a good day’s work—only that memory now appeared to be free from any kind of adult stain.”
― Anita Brookner, A Closed Eye

“For they themselves were still beautiful, designed for a more beautiful life than the one in which they found themselves becalmed. She saw that they were more stoical, had more depth, than she had ever perceived.”
― Anita Brookner, A Closed Eye

“Perhaps most women did. Perhaps most women had unfulfilled life left in them, and sought a way to use it.”
― Anita Brookner, A Closed Eye

“He knew that he did not make Harriet happy, but tended to disregard this. Happiness was what young people wanted; at his age he knew that comfort was more important. He had made her comfortable, and in that he was prepared to take a grim pride. After all, nobody else had done as much.”
― Anita Brookner, A Closed Eye

“And she had had her pick of young men, was irresistible to the easily impressed. If she had married a weak man she would always have retained the upper hand. Not perhaps have known true happiness, but on the other hand never have known doubt. She would have stayed in character, stayed safe. Instead she had lighted on a strong man, and had instantly gone under. The doom, the terrible doom of a woman like that in thrall to the wrong man! Unused to circumspection, she had been revealed as simple, obstinate, and finally without resource, disarmed. This discovery had left her with a kind of hatred, which, as surely as anything else, would militate against any kind of happiness, which concessions might just bring about. But with a man like Jack, she thought, one could not count on happiness anyway. Women would find him attractive, and he would find them convenient. He was not made for conventional alliances.”
― Anita Brookner, A Closed Eye