I wonder if I were to have an X-ray at the little hospital, would the machine see my grief? Is it like rust, rheum about the heart?

— Sebastian Barry

Memory, I must suppose, if it is neglected becomes like a box room, or a lumber room in an old house, the contents jumbled about, maybe not only from neglect but also from too much haphazard searching in them, and things to boot thrown in that don't belong there.

— Sebastian Barry

Men so sick they are dying of death.

— Sebastian Barry

Roseanne, Roseanne, if I called to you now, my own self calling to my own self, would you hear me? And if you could hear me, would you heed me?

— Sebastian Barry

The bottom was always falling out of something in America far as I could see.

— Sebastian Barry

The human animal began as a mere wriggling thing in the ancient seas, struggling out onto land with many regrets. That is what brings us so full of longing to the sea.

— Sebastian Barry

The real comfort is that the history of the world contains so much grief that my small griefs are edged out, and are only cinders at the borders of the fire. I am saying this again because I want it to be true.

— Sebastian Barry

There are some sufferings that we seem as a creature to forget, or we would never survive as a creature among all the other creatures.

— Sebastian Barry

There is such solace in the mere sight of water. It clothes us delicately in its blowing salt and scent, gossamer items that medicate the poor soul

— Sebastian Barry

The thing itself, the first thing, will never do us alone, we must be elaborating, improving, poeticizing.

— Sebastian Barry