Zitate und Sprüche von Kazuo Ishiguro

I keep thinking about this river somewhere, with the water moving really fast. And these two people in the water, trying to hold onto each other, holding on as hard as they can, but in the end it's just too much. The current's too strong. They've got to let go, drift apart.

There was another life that I might have had, but I am having this one.

Memories, even your most precious ones, fade surprisingly quickly. But I don't go along with that. The memories I value most, I don't ever see them fading.

Sometimes I get so immersed in my own company, if I unexpectedly run into someone I know, it's a bit of a shock and takes me a while to adjust.

But then again I wonder if what we feel in our hearts today isn't like these raindrops still falling on us from the soaked leaves above, even though the sky itself long stopped raining. I'm wondering if without our memories, there's nothing for it but for our love to fade and die.

When it was too late for rescue, it was still early enough for revenge.

How is it possible to hate so deeply for deeds not yet done?

A couple may claim to be bonded by love, but we boatmen may see instead resentment, anger, even hatred. Or a great barrenness. Sometimes a fear of loneliness and nothing more.

What use is a god with boundless mercy, sir? You mock me as a pagan, yet the gods of my ancestors pronounce clearly their ways and punish severely when we break their laws. Your Christian god of mercy gives men licence to pursue their greed, their lust for land and blood, knowing a few prayers and a little penance will bring forgiveness and blessing.

The danger isn't the river's speed, friend, but its slowness.

We took away your art because we thought it would reveal your souls. Or to put it more finely, we did it to prove you had souls at all.

I want my words to survive translation.

It was like when you make a move in chess and just as you take your finger off the piece, you see the mistake you've made, and there's this panic because you don't know yet the scale of disaster you've left yourself open to.

All children have to be deceived if they are to grow up without trauma.

You say you're sure? Sure that you're in love? How can you know it? You think love is so simple?

The evening's the best part of the day. You've done your day's work. Now you can put your feet up and enjoy it.

If you are under the impression you have already perfected yourself, you will never rise to the heights you are no doubt capable of.

The problem, as I see it, is that you've been told and not told. You've been told, but none of you really understand, and I dare say, some people are quite happy to leave it that way.

As a writer, I'm more interested in what people tell themselves happened rather than what actually happened.

After all, what can we ever gain in forever looking back and blaming ourselves if our lives have not turned out quite as we might have wished?

The giant, once well buried, now stirs. When soon he rises, as surely he will, the friendly bonds between us will prove as knots young girls make with the stems of small flowers.

Indeed - why should I not admit it? - in that moment, my heart was breaking.

Sometimes you must hurt in order to know, fall in order to grow, lose in order to gain. Because life's greatest lessons are learned through pain.

Sometimes in life when you get what you want, you end up missing what you left behind.

Justice comes from vengeance but justice only breeds more vengeance.

Tyler… you drown not by falling into the river, but by staying submerged in it.