JBJ.G. Ballard

80 collected words

J.G. Ballard

Dates not recorded

Name supplied in the contributor-provided quotation collection. Basic attribution label; identity, lifetime and quotation authenticity have not been independently verified.

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Quotations and sayings

01Undated

I'm a strong opponent of all religious belief.(Conversations pg 96)

J.G. Ballard / quote

02Undated

Have you noticed how vocabularies fluctuate in order to cope with our need to justify ourselves?

J.G. Ballard / quote

03Undated

I believe in the power of the imagination to remake the world, to release the truth within us, to hold back the night, to transcend death, to charm motorways, to ingratiate ourselves with birds, to enlist the confidences of madmen.

J.G. Ballard / quote

04Undated

As Miriam released my hand I felt that she and Midwife Bell had returned to a more primitive world, where men never intruded and even their role in conception was unknown. Here the chain of life was mother to daughter, daughter to mother. Fathers and sons belonged in the shadows with the dogs and livestock, like the retriever growling at Midwife Bell's unfamiliar car from the window of my neighbours' living room.

J.G. Ballard / quote

05Undated

Tourism is the great soporific. It's a huge confidence trick, and gives people the dangerous idea that there's something interesting in their lives. It's musical chairs in reverse..... All the upgrades in existence lead to the same airports and resort hotels, the same pina colada bullshit. The tourists smile at their tans and their shiny teeth and think they're happy. But the suntans hide who they really are-- salary slaves, with heads full of American rubbish. Travel is the last fantasy the 2oth Century left us, the delusion that going somewhere helps you reinvent yourself.

J.G. Ballard / quote

06Undated

These people were the first to master a new kind of late twentieth-century life. They thrived on the rapid turnover of acquaintances, the lack of involvement with others, and the total self-sufficiency of lives which, needing nothing, were never disappointed.

J.G. Ballard / quote

07Undated

Kandinski looked up. 'Do you read science fiction?' he asked matter-of-factly.'Not as a rule,' Ward admitted. When Kandinski said nothing he went on: 'Perhaps I’m too skeptical, but I can’t take it too seriously.'Kandinski pulled at a blister on his palm. 'No one suggests you should. What you mean is that you take it too seriously.'Accepting the rebuke with a smile at himself, Ward pulled out one of the magazines and sat down at a table next to Kandinski. On the cover was a placid suburban setting of snugly eaved houses, yew trees, and children’s bicycles. Spreading slowly across the roof-tops was an enormous pulpy nightmare, blocking out the sun behind it and throwing a weird phosphorescent glow over the roofs and lawns. 'You’re probably right,' Ward said, showing the cover to Kandinski. 'I’d hate to want to take that seriously.'("The Venus Hunters")

J.G. Ballard / quote

08Undated

Once it gets off the ground into space, all science fiction is fantasy.

J.G. Ballard / quote

09Undated

Even their insistence on educating their children, the last reflex of any exploited group before it sank into submission, marked the end of their resistance.

J.G. Ballard / quote

10Undated

The bourgeois novel is the greatest enemy of truth and honesty that was ever invented.

J.G. Ballard / quote

11Undated

Dissembling was so large a part of middle-class life that honesty and frankness seemed the most devious stratagem of all. The most outright lie was the closest one came to truth.

J.G. Ballard / quote

12Undated

Jim watched them eat, his eyes fixed on every morsel that entered their mouth. When the oldest of the four soldiers had finished he scraped some burnt rice and fish scales from the side of the cooking pot. A first-class private of some forty years, with slow, careful hands, he beckoned Jim forward and handed him his mess tin. As they smoked their cigarettes the Japanese smiled to themselves, watching Jim devour the shreds of fatty rice. It was his first hot food since he had left he hospital, and the heat and greasy flavour stung his gums. Tears swam in his eyes. The Japanese soldier who had taken pity on Jim, recognising that this small boy was starving, began to laugh good-naturedly, and pulled the rubber plug from his metal water-bottle. Jim drank the clear, chlorine-flavoured liquid, so unlike the stagnant water in the taps of the Columbia Road. He choked, carefully swallowed his vomit, and tittered into his hands, grinning at the Japanese. Soon they were all laughing together, sitting back in the deep grass beside the drained swimming-pool.

J.G. Ballard / quote

13Undated

The house was silent, but somewhere in the garden was a swimming pool filled with unsettled water.

J.G. Ballard / quote

14Undated

She glanced at her watch, reminding herself who she was.

J.G. Ballard / quote

15Undated

I'm a strong opponent of all religious belief....And supposedly 95% of Americans say they believe in God - that's worrying....Religions are Trojan horses which conceal profoundly strange psychopathy strains. There's no other explanation for them. The sheer fear of death has been the main engine of religions for a very long time.

J.G. Ballard / quote

16Undated

The trouble with you people is that you've been here for thirty million years and your perspectives are all wrong. You miss so much of the transitory beauty of life.

J.G. Ballard / quote

17Undated

...the arts and criminality have always flourished side by side.

J.G. Ballard / quote

18Undated

Togetherness is beating up an empty elevator.

J.G. Ballard / quote

19Undated

In the future, violence would clearly become a valuable form of social cement.

J.G. Ballard / quote

20Undated

So, with all this time on my hands, I decided to start a revolution.

J.G. Ballard / quote

21Undated

He walked into the bathroom, wincing at himself in the mirror, that always more tired older brother.

J.G. Ballard / quote

22Undated

No one could have imagined the effects the Internet would have: …there’s a vast new intimacy and accidental poetry, not to mention the weirdest porn. The entire human experience seems to unveil itself like the surface of a new planet." JG Ballard, 2004

J.G. Ballard / quote

23Undated

Recently she had become intrigued by the admiring glances of other women. The admiration of her own sex existed on a higher and more intense plane than anything men could offer, like the romantic rivalries of sisters. Together, women formed a conspiracy of glances entirely exchanged behind the backs of their menfolk.

J.G. Ballard / quote

24Undated

He methodically basted the dark skin of the Alsatian, which he had stuffed with garlic and herbs."One rule in life", he murmured to himself. "If you can smell garlic, everything is all right".

J.G. Ballard / quote