A complete woman is probably not a very admirable creature. She is manipulative, uses other people to get her own way, and works within whatever system she is in.
Anita Brookner

A man of such obvious and exemplary charm must be a liar.
Anita Brookner

Accountability in friendship is the equivalent of love without strategy.
Anita Brookner

All good fortune is a gift of the gods, and you don't win the favor of the ancient gods by being good, but by being bold.
Anita Brookner

Existentialism is about being a saint without God; being your own hero, without all the sanction and support of religion or society.
Anita Brookner

Good women always think it is their fault when someone else is being offensive. Bad women never take the blame for anything.
Anita Brookner

Great writers are the saints for the godless.
Anita Brookner

In real life, it is the hare who wins. Every time. Look around you. And in any case it is my contention that Aesop was writing for the tortoise market. Hares have no time to read. They are too busy winning the game.
Anita Brookner

In real life, of course, it is the hare that wins. Every time. Look around you.
Anita Brookner

It is my contention that Aesop was writing for the tortoise market. hares have no time to read.
Anita Brookner

It will be a pity if women in the more conventional mould are to be phased out, for there will never be anyone to go home to.
Anita Brookner

Life... is not simply a series of exciting new ventures. The future is not always a whole new ball game. There tends to be unfinished business. One trails all sorts of things around with one, things that simply won't be got rid of.
Anita Brookner

Like many rich men, he thought in anecdotes; like many simple women, she thought in terms of biography.
Anita Brookner

No blame should attach to telling the truth. But it does, it does.
Anita Brookner

Old men should have more care to end life well than to live long.
Anita Brookner

Real love is a pilgrimage. It happens when there is no strategy, but it is very rare because most people are strategists.
Anita Brookner

The essence of romantic love is that wonderful beginning, after which sadness and impossibility may become the rule.
Anita Brookner

The lessons taught in great books are misleading. The commerce in life is rarely so simple and never so just.
Anita Brookner

There are moments when you feel free, moments when you have energy, moments when you have hope, but you can't rely on any of these things to see you through. Circumstances do that.
Anita Brookner

Time misspent in youth is sometimes all the freedom one ever has.
Anita Brookner