Alive. Alive in the way that death is alive.

— John Fowles

A mixture, before the English, of irritation and bafflement, of having this same language, same past, so many same things, and yet not belonging to them anymore. Being worse than rootless... speciesless.

— John Fowles

An answer is always a form of death.

— John Fowles

...and his eyes had that splendid innocence, that opaque blue candor of the satanically fallen. ~ The French Lieutenant’s Woman

— John Fowles

And I envy you. You have the one thing that matters. You have all your discoveries before you.

— John Fowles

And like most people who have spent much of their adult life being emotionally dishonest, I overcalculated the sympathy a final being honest would bring

— John Fowles

Art's cruel. You can get away with murder with words. But a picture is like a window straight through to your inmost heart.

— John Fowles

A total stranger, and one not of one's sex, is often the least prejudiced judge.

— John Fowles

A word (...) is never the destination, merely a signpost in its general direction; and whatever (...) body that destination finally acquires owes quite as much to the reader as to the writer.

— John Fowles

Because they died, we know we still live. Because a star explodes and a thousand worlds like ours die, we know this world is. That is the smile: that what might not be, is.

— John Fowles