Ten of My Favourite J.M. Coetzee Quotes
Love reading? Then it’s likely you will love a good quote from your favourite author. This article covers J.M. Coetzee’s Top 10 Popular and Famous Quotes that we at Australia Unwrapped have collected from some of his greatest works. J.M. Coetzee quotes to remember and here you will find 10 of the best. A memorable quote can stay with you and can be used along your journey. Choosing J.M. Coetzee’s top 10 quotes is not easy, but here they are:
Popular Quotes
“When all else fails, philosophize.”
― J.M. Coetzee, Disgrace
“I want to find a way of speaking to fellow human beings that will be cool rather than heated, philosophical rather than polemical, that will bring enlightenment rather than seeking to divide us into the righteous and the sinners, the saved and the damned, the sheep and the goats.”
― J.M. Coetzee, The Lives of Animals
“Truth is not spoken in anger. Truth is spoken, if it ever comes to be spoken, in love. The gaze of love is not deluded. It sees what is best in the beloved even when what is best in the beloved finds it hard to emerge into the light.”
― J.M. Coetzee, Slow Man
“His own opinion, which he does not air, is that the origin of speech lie in song, and the origins of song in the need to fill out with sound the overlarge and rather empty human soul.”
― J.M. Coetzee, Disgrace
“Become major, Paul. Live like a hero. That’s what the classics teach us. Be a main character. Otherwise what is life for?”
― J.M. Coetzee
“(I)f we are going to be kind, let it be out of simple generosity, not because we fear guilt or retribution.”
― J.M. Coetzee, Disgrace
“We must cultivate, all of us, a certain ignorance, a certain blindness, or society will not be tolerable.”
― J.M. Coetzee, Foe
“The secret of happiness is not doing what we like but in liking what we do.”
― J.M. Coetzee
“A book should be an axe to chop open the frozen sea inside us.”
― J.M. Coetzee, Summertime
“Pain is truth; all else is subject to doubt.”
― J.M. Coetzee, Waiting for the Barbarians
10 Famous Quotes by Author J.M. Coetzee
10 quotes by J.M. Coetzee there you go! It’s never an easy task picking the best quotations from great writers, so please if you disagree or have more to add, please comment and share your opinions. My 10 greatest J.M. Coetzee quotes will likely be different from yours; however, that’s the best thing about them, each quote can mean something different to each person. So don’t wait, comment and shares your best J.M. Coetzee Quote.
One Final Bonus – J.M. Coetzee Quote
“He continues to teach because it provides him with a livelihood; also because it teaches him humility, brings it home to him who he is in the world. The irony does not escape him: that the one who comes to teach learns the keenest of lessons, while those who come to learn learn nothing.”
― J.M. Coetzee, Disgrace
