To look at ourselves from afar, to make the subjective suddenly objective: this gives us a psychic shock.
Julian BarnesHe had a better mind and a more rigorous temperament than me; he thought logically, and then acted on the conclusion of logical thought. Whereas most of us, I suspect, do the opposite: we make an instinctive decision, then build up an infrastructure of reasoning to justify it. And call the result common sense.
Julian BarnesLife โฆ is a bit like reading. โฆ If all your responses to a book have already been duplicated and expanded upon by a professional critic, then what point is there to your reading? Only that itโs yours. Similarly, why live your life? Because itโs yours. But what if such an answer becomes less and less convincing?
Julian Barnes