Joseph Conrad Quotes

Little islands are all large prisons: one cannot look at the sea without wishing for the wings of a swallow.

I'm like a caged animal sometimes. Let me yearn to breathe free.

There is one kind of prison where the man is behind bars, and everything that he desires is outside; and there is another kind where the things are behind the bars, and the man is outside.

Of what use were wings to a man fast bound in chains of iron?

During the period of house arrest, I had an electronic manacle around my leg for 24 hours a day, and for someone who has tried to give others liberty all their adult life, that is absolutely intolerable.

They weren't crazy. They were tired of being locked up. Even I could see that.

It's difficult to put into words what freedom feels like. You only know what freedom feels like if you know what it feels like to not be free.

Stone walls do not a prison make, nor iron bars a cage.

Probably the only place where a man can feel really secure is in a maximum security prison, except for the imminent threat of release.

You'll never know how sweet freedom can be unless you've lost it for eight and a half years.

300 was the biggest hurdle. They tried to hold us against our will.

Those who build walls are their own prisoners.

I never saw a man who looked With such a wistful eye Upon that little tent of blue Which prisoners call the sky.

Chains tie us down by land and sea; And wishes, vain as mine, may be All that is left to comfort thee.

So close to touching freedom, then I hear the guards call my name

Caged birds accept each other, but flight is what they long for.

If the bird does like its cage, and does like its sugar and will not leave it, why keep the door so very carefully shut?

PRISON, n. A place of punishments and rewards. The poet assures us that - stone walls do not a prison make.

Hee is not free that drawes his chaine.

Finn smiled ruefully. "I'm a Prisoner, old man. Just like you.

Fetters of gold are still fetters, and the softest lining can never make them so easy as liberty.

No good ever comes from putting up walls. What people mistake for safety is in fact captivity. And few things thrive in captivity.

No bird in a cage ever speaks. What is there to say? The sky is everywhere, churning above its head, blue and endless, calling out to it. But the caged bird can't answer anything except 'I cannot'.

He who is conceived in a cage yearns for the cage.

A forest bird never wants a cage.