Ruth Rendell Quotes

What a miserable thing life is: you're living in clover, only the clover isn't good enough.

Our desires always disappoint us; for though we meet with something that gives us satisfaction, yet it never thoroughly answers our expectation.

I've had a perfectly wonderful evening. But this wasn't it.

I don't know whether I'm misanthropic. It seems to me I'm constantly disappointed. I'm very easily disappointed. Disappointed in the things that people do; disappointed in the things that people construct. I want things to be better all the time.

When you see somebody who's got a complaining personality, it usually means that they had some vision of what things could be, and they're constantly disappointed by that. I think that would be the camp that I would fall into - constantly horrified by the things people do.

When the only thing you look forward to in life is lunch, you know you have had your just desserts, and it is time to call it a day.

You know you can't satisfy anybody.

If you are foolish enough to be contented, don't show it, but grumble with the rest.

Life does not measure up to performing... Performing is perfect.

It's always bitterly disappointing to people to see how normally one can live.

My father cared a lot about me, but he never gave me the satisfaction of really knowing it. Hitting .390 wasn't enough for him. Nothing seemed to be. He was not trying to be mean. He was just seeing to it that I never got self-satisfied, that I worked hard to get the most out of what I had.

I foolishly thought that if I just 'made it' then everything would be okay. And everything wasn't okay.

If you're alive for more than five minutes, you're going to be disappointed.

Nothing seems to come up to your expectations. But nothing I had heard about Hollywood was enough.

I think that if you idealise someone for so long, they can only disappoint and I wouldn't want to be disappointed by those people.

I was promised on a time - to have reason for my rhyme; From that time unto this season, I received nor rhyme nor reason.

I feel like sometimes that I was not meant for this society.

Life does not owe me a shred.

I don't very often think I've done a good job. I don't like the majority of what I do. I shouldn't say I don't like it, but I'm not satisfied with almost everything that I do.

Where I live, in Vermont, there's this thing that women know about men, which is this disease: their childhood was so idyllic that nothing in the rest of their life can ever be satisfying. It's almost a plague.

In regards to the reaction to Life Is Killing Me, I would say that I'm never happy about anything.

People from New York have been calling, to see if I'm still alive. When I answer the phone, you can hear the disappointment in their voice.

There is no satisfaction to be derived from having had many of our arguments borne out by events.

I intended to be famous by the time I was 16 and rich by the time I was 20. Curiously, it didn't pan out!

But here's the thing: I had this great job, and I would still feel terribly depressed. I would just be like, 'This isn't the sweet spot. I thought this would be it, and I don't feel happy.'