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A Story Has No Beginning Or End: Arbitrarily One Chooses That Moment Of Experience From Which To Look Back Or From Which To Look Ahead.
-Graham Greene
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A Story Has No

Graham Greene
...
A Story Has No Beginning Or End: Arbitrarily One Chooses That Moment Of Experience From Which To Look Back Or From Which To Look Ahead.

Understanding the Quote: "a story has no beginning or end: arbitrarily one chooses that moment..."

This quote by Graham Greene reflects deeply on the theme of looks. It connects to the universal human journey of purpose, motivation, and reflection. Often categorized under Looks, Stories, Moments, the quote offers insight, emotional clarity, and intellectual inspiration to readers worldwide.

Whether you’re a student exploring new ideas, a leader trying to motivate your team, or someone seeking direction in life — this quote provides value. It resonates because it’s more than words — it’s a bridge between experience and wisdom. It shows how Graham Greene interprets life's core challenges and triumphs.

Lessons From the Quote

This quote teaches resilience and focus. It reminds readers that no matter where they stand in life, reflection and self-awareness lead to growth. Each word has meaning, and when studied, it becomes clear how impactful thoughtful language can be.

About Graham Greene

Graham Greene is celebrated for insightful thoughts on looks and stories. Their legacy lives on through writings that guide, comfort, and inspire. Discover more on their profile page.

Actionable Takeaways

  • Reflect on how this quote applies to your current life path.
  • Share the message with someone who needs inspiration.
  • Write your thoughts on this quote in a journal or blog post.
  • Use it as a daily affirmation or reminder.

Closing Thoughts

Quotes like this endure because they capture universal truths. They comfort us in solitude and empower us in groups. Carry this quote forward — live by its wisdom, share its message, and keep its essence alive.

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Topic
Looks
Stories
Moments
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Bleeding
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Distance
Writing
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Guilt
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Bankers
Encounters
All The Emotions Have Something In Common. People Are Quite Aware Of The Sorrow There Always Is In Lust, But They Are Not So Aware Of The Lust There Is In Sorrow.
People
Lust
Sorrow
When He Was Young, He Had Thought Love Had Something To Do With Understanding, But With Age He Knew That No Human Being Understood Another. Love Was The Wish To Understand, And Presently With Constant Failure The Wish Died, And Love Died Too Perhaps Or Changed Into This Painful Affection, Loyalty, Pity.
Love
Loyalty
Understanding
And When We Love Our Sin Then We Are Damned Indeed.
Sin
My Two Fingers On A Typewriter Have Never Connected With My Brain. My Hand On A Pen Does. A Fountain Pen, Of Course. Ball-point Pens Are Only Good For Filling Out Forms On A Plane.
Typewriters
Hands
Two
One Gets Started, And Then, Suddenly, One Cannot Remember What Toothpaste They Use . . . The Moment Comes When A Character Does Or Says Something You Hadn't Thought About. At That Moment He's Alive And You Leave It To Him.
Character
Doe
Use
My Passion For Sarah Had Killed Simple Lust Forever. Never Again Would I Be Able To Enjoy A Woman Without Love.
Passion
Simple
Forever
There Are Times When A Lover Longs To Be Also A Father And A Brother: He Is Jealous Of The Years He Hasn't Shared.
Brother
Father
Jealous
That Instinct For Human Character That Is Perhaps Inherent In An Imaginative Writer.
Character
Instinct
Imaginative
A Movie Is Not A Book. If The Source Material Is A Book, You Cannot Be Too Respectful Of The Book. All You Owe To The Book Is The Spirit.
Movie
Book
Actors
She Was Not Too Young To Be Wise, But She Was Too Young To Know That Wisdom Shouldn't Be Spoken Aloud When You Are Happy.
Wise
Being Wise
Young
We Can Love With Our Minds, But Can We Love Only With Our Minds? Love Extends Itself All The Time, So That We Can Love Even With Our Senseless Nails: We Love Even With Our Clothes, So That A Sleeve Can Feel A Sleeve.
Mind Love
Clothes
Nails
Writing Is A Form Of Therapy; Sometimes I Wonder How All Those Who Do Not Write, Compose Or Paint Can Manage To Escape The Madness, Melancholia, The Panic And Fear Which Is Inherent In A Human Situation.
Love
Depression
Fear
I Had Never Known Her Before And I Had Never Loved Her So Much. The More We Know The More We Love, I Thought.
Knows
Known
In Switzerland They Had Brotherly Love, Five Hundred Years Of Democracy And Peace, And What Did They Produce? The Cuckoo Clock!
Love
Peace
Years
I Can Never Think Of You As A Friend. You Can Do Without A Friend.
Thinking
Think Of You
I Can
I Have Never Understood Why People Who Can Swallow The Enormous Improbability Of A Personal God Boggle At A Personal Devil.
People
Devil
Enormous
I Could Have Waited Years, Now That I Knew The End Of The Story. I Was Cold And Wet And Very Happy. I Could Even Look With Charity Towards The Altar And The Figure Dangling There. She Loves Us Both, I Thought, But If There Is To Be A Conflict Between An Image And A Man, I Know Who Will Win. I Could Put My Hand On Her Thigh Or My Mouth On Her Breast; He Was Imprisoned Behind The Altar And Couldn't Move To Plead His Cause.
Moving
Winning
Men
Unfortunately The Innocent Are Always Involved In Any Conflict. Always, Everywhere, There Is Some Voice Crying From A Tower.
Voice
Towers
Innocence
Insecurity Twists Meanings And Poisons Trust. In A Closely Beleaguered City Every Sentry Is A Potential Traitor.
Trust
Cities
Insecurity
Those Who Marry God Can Become Domesticated Too - It's Just As Hum-drum A Marriage As All The Others. The Word Love Means A Formal Touch Of The Lips As In The Ceremony Of The Mass, And Ave Maria Like Dearest Is A Phrase To Open A Letter. This Marriage Like The World's Marriages Was Held Together By Habits And Tastes Shared In Common Between God And Themselves - It Was God's Taste To Be Worshipped And Their Taste To Worship, But Only At Stated Hours Like A Suburban Embrace On A Saturday Night.
Love
Mean
Night
Cruel Men Cry Easily At The Cinema.
Men
Cinema
Sentimental
Our Heroes Are Simple: They Are Brave, They Tell The Truth, They Are Good Swordsmen And They Are Never In The Long Run Really Defeated. That Is Why No Later Books Satisfy Us Like Those Which Were Read To Us In Childhood - For Those Promised A World Of Great Simplicity Of Which We Knew The Rules, But The Later Books Are Complicated And Contradictory With Experience; They Are Formed Out Of Our Own Disappointing Memories.
Running
Memories
Book
So It Always Is: When You Escape To A Desert The Silence Shouts In Your Ear.
Silence
Desert
Ears
Success Is More Dangerous Than Failure, The Ripples Break Over A Wider Coastline.
Success
Congratulations
Break
In The End There Is No Desire So Deep As The Simple Desire For Companionship.
Simple
Desire
Companionship
A Ruling Passion Gives To A Shelf Of Novels The Unity Of A System.
Passion
Giving
Unity
Would The World Be In The Mess It Is If We Were Loyal To Love And Not To Countries?
Country
Patriotism
World
Champagne, If You Are Seeking The Truth, Is Better Than A Lie Detector.
Lying
Drinking
Wine
This (vietnam) Was A Land Of Rebellious Barons. It Was Like Europe In The Middle Ages. But What Were The Americans Doing Here? Columbus Had Not Yet Discovered Their Country.
Country
Europe
Land
He Was Like A Child With Haemophilia: Every Contact Drew Blood.
Children
Blood
Contact
Tea At College Was Served On Long Tables With An Urn At The End Of Each. Long Baguettes Of Bread, Three To A Table, Were Set Out With Meagre Portions Of Butter And Jam; The China Was Coarse To Withstand The Schoolboy-clutch And The Tea Strong. At The Hôtel De Paris I Was Astonished At The Fragility Of The Cups, The Silver Teapot, The Little Triangular Savoury Sandwiches, The éclairs Stuffed With Cream.
Strong
Food
College
Men Can Become Twins With Age. The Past Was Their Common Womb; The Six Months Of Rain And The Six Months Of Sun Was The Period Of Their Common Gestation. They Needed Only A Few Words And A Few Gestures To Convey Their Meaning. They Had Graduated Through The Same Fevers, They Were Moved By The Same Love And Contempt.
Love
Rain
Men
Like Some Wines Our Love Could Neither Mature Nor Travel.
Break Up
Breakup
Wine
And There, In That Phrase, The Bitterness Leaks Again Out Of My Pen. What A Dull Lifeless Quality This Bitterness Is. If I Could I Would Write With Love, But If I Could Write With Love I Would Be Another Man; I Would Never Have Lost Love.
Lost Love
Writing
Men
I'm Only Saying I Want You To Be Happy. I Hate Your Being Unhappy. I Don't Mind Anything You Do That Makes You Happy." You Just Want An Excuse. If I Sleep With Anybody Else, You Feel You Can Do The Same - Any Time." That's Neither Here Nor There. I Want You To Be Happy, That's All." You'd Make My Bed For Me?" Perhaps.
Hate
Sleep
Mind
Self-expression Is A Hard And Selfish Thing. It Eats Everything, Even The Self. At The End You Find You Haven't Even Got A Self To Express.
Selfish
Expression
Ends
Death Was Far More Certain Than God.
Certain
One Can't Love Humanity. One Can Only Love People.
People
Humanity
Sociology
God Is Love. I Don't Say The Heart Doesn't Feel A Taste Of It, But What A Taste. The Smallest Glass Of Love Mixed With A Pint Pot Of Ditch-water. We Wouldn't Recognize That Love. It Might Even Look Like Hate. It Would Be Enough To Scare Us - God's Love.
Running
Hate
Heart
I Wish Sometimes You Had A Few Bad Motives, You Might Understand A Little More About Human Beings.
Wish
Littles
Might
Perhaps The Sexual Life Is The Great Test. If We Can Survive It With Charity To Those We Love And With Affection To Those We Have Betrayed, We Needn't Worry So Much About The Good And The Bad In Us. But Jealousy, Distrust, Cruelty, Revenge, Recrimination ... Then We Fail. The Wrong Is In That Failure Even If We Are The Victims And Not The Executioners. Virtue Is No Excuse.
Revenge
Worry
Tests
Cynicism Is Cheap - You Can Buy It At Any Monoprix Store - It's Built Into All Poor-quality Goods.
Quality Goods
Poor Quality
Cynicism
As Long As One Suffers One Lives.
Long
Suffering
Pain Is Easy To Write. In Pain We're All Happily Individual. But What Can One Write About Happiness?
Pain
Writing
Easy
They Think My Mother's Ashes Are Marijuana.
Mother
Marijuana
Thinking
So Long As One Is Happy One Can Endure Any Discipline: It Was Unhappiness That Broke Down The Habits Of Work.
Discipline
Long
Unhappiness
He Felt The Loyalty We Feel To Unhappiness - The Sense That Is Where We Really Belong.
Happiness
Loyalty
Literature
From Childhood I Had Never Believed In Permanence, And Yet I Had Longed For It. Always I Was Afraid Of Losing Happiness. This Month, Next Year...death Was The Only Absolute Value In My World. Lose Life And One Would Lose Nothing Again Forever.
Years
Childhood
Forever
Fame Is A Powerful Aphrodisiac.
Powerful
Aphrodisiac
Fame
Death Will Come In Any Case, And There Is A Long Afterwards If The Priests Are Right And Nothing To Fear If They Are Wrong.
Long
Priests
Cases
We Are All Of Us Resigned To Death: It's Life We Aren't Resigned To.
Death
Near Death
Resigned
Yesterday I Went Home With Him And We Did The Usual Things. I Haven't The Nerve To Put Them Down, But I'd Like To, Because Now When I'm Writing It's Already Tomorrow And I'm Afraid Of Getting To The End Of Yesterday. As Long As I Go On Writing, Yesterday Is Today And We Are Still Together
Home
Writing
Yesterday
It Was Like Having A Box Of Chocolates Shut In The Bedroom Drawer. Until The Box Was Empty It Occupied The Mind Too Much.
Chocolate
Mind
Too Much
I Get Fed Up With All This Nonsense Of Ringing People Up And Lighting Cigarettes And Answering The Doorbell That Passes For Action In So Many Modern Plays.
Writing
Play
People
A Story Has No Beginning Or End: Arbitrarily One Chooses That Moment Of Experience From Which To Look Back Or From Which To Look Ahead.
Looks
Stories
Moments
The Argument Of Danger Only Applies To Those Who Live In Relative Safety.
Safety
Argument
Danger
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