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Now I no longer wish to be loved, beautiful, happy or successful. I want one thing and one thing only - to be left alone.

Jean Rhys

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Jean Rhys
Age: 88 †
Born: 1890
Born: August 24
Died: 1979
Died: May 14
Novelist
Writer
Ella Gwendolen Rees Williams
Ella Rees Williams
Left
Beautiful
Thing
Longer
Loved
Successful
Alone
Happy
Wish

More quotes by Jean Rhys

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...I know all about myself now, I know. You've told me so often. You haven't left me one rag of illusion to clothe myself in.
Jean Rhys
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If I was bound for hell, let it be hell. No more false heaven. No more damned magic.
Jean Rhys
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I didn't know, I didn't know, I didn't know.
Jean Rhys
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Cold - cold as truth, cold as life. No, nothing can be as cold as life.
Jean Rhys
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The rumble of the life outside was like the sound of the sea which was rising gradually around her.
Jean Rhys
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that expression you get in your eyes when you are very tired and everything is like a dream and you are starting to know what things are like underneath what people say they are.
Jean Rhys
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No past to make us sentimental, no future to embarrass us...a difficult moment when you are out of practice - a moment that makes you go cold, cold and wary.
Jean Rhys
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And what does anyone know about traitors, or why Judas did what he did?
Jean Rhys
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All of a writer that matters is in the book or books. It is idiotic to be curious about the person.
Jean Rhys
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I watched her die many times. In my way, not in hers. In sunlight, in shadow, by moonlight, by candlelight. In the long afternoons when the house was empty. Only the sun was there to keep us company. We shut him out. And why not? Very soon she was as eager for what's called loving as I was - more lost and drowned afterwards.
Jean Rhys
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When I think about it, if I had to choose, I'd rather be happy than write.
Jean Rhys
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All of writing is a huge lake. There are great rivers that feed the lake, like Tolstoy or Dostoyevsky. And then there are mere trickles, like Jean Rhys. All that matters is feeding the lake. I don't matter. The lake matters. You must keep feeding the lake.
Jean Rhys
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She’ll have no lover, for I don’t want her and she’ll see no other.
Jean Rhys
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I hadn't bargained for this. I didn't think it would be like this - shabby clothes, worn-out shoes, circles under your eyes, your hair getting straight and lanky, the way people look at you. ... I didn't think it would be like this
Jean Rhys
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I am the only real truth I know.
Jean Rhys
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I've been so ridiculous all my life that a little bit more or a little bit less hardly matters now.
Jean Rhys
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I want more of this feeling - fire and wings.
Jean Rhys
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The feeling of Sunday is the same everywhere, heavy, melancholy, standing still.
Jean Rhys
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We can't all be happy, we can't all be rich, we can't all be lucky - and it would be so much less fun if we were... There must be the dark background to show up the bright colours.
Jean Rhys
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But they never last, the golden days. And it can be sad, the sun in the afternoon, can't it? Yes, it can be sad, the afternoon sun, sad and frightening.
Jean Rhys