William Golding

“In our country for all her greatness there is one thing she cannot do and that is translate a person wholly out of one class into another. Perfect translation from one language into another is impossible. Class is the British language.”

“While I was still a boy, I came to the conclusion that there were three grades of thinking; and since I was later to claim thinking as my hobby, I came to an even stranger conclusion - namely, that I myself could not think at all.”

“The greatest pleasure is not - say - sex or geometry. It is just understanding. And if you can get people to understand their own humanity - well, that's the job of the writer.”

“Sleep is when all the unsorted stuff comes flying out as from a dustbin upset in a high wind.”

“Man produces evil as a bee produces honey.”

“If you... scaled down human beings, scaled down society, if you land with a group of little boys, they are more like a scaled-down version of society than a group of little girls would be.”

“The three boys stood in the darkness, striving unsuccessfully to convey the majesty of adult life”

“I have always understood the Nazis because I am of that sort by nature.”

“Childhood is a disease - a sickness that you grow out of.”

“My yesterdays walk with me. They keep step, they are gray faces that peer over my shoulder.”

“The thing is--fear can't hurt you any more than a dream.”

“I am by nature an optimist and by intellectual conviction a pessimist.”

“מה טוב יותר, לחיות עם חוקים ולהסכים זה עם זה או לצוד ולהרוג?”

“פחד אינו יכול לפגוע יותר מאשר חלום.”

“אם אתה מפחד ממישהו, אתה שונא אותו.”

“אנשים נדהמים לגלות כמה מעט יודע האדם על זולתו.”

“איני מתיימר להיות גיבור אבל אני בריא, משכיל וחכם.”

“הרעיונות הטובים ביותר הם הפשוטים ביותר.”

“אנשים סובלים מבורות לגבי הטבע האנושי.”

“קיימים יותר בשתיקותיהם מאשר בדיבורם.”