Alan Furst Quotes

The world is becoming nicer and easier, but that doesn't mean we are any less lonely or any more connected.

You could say that all novels are spy novels and all novelists are spy masters.

I've always loved spy stories. Who can resist?

I love the combination of the words 'spies' and 'Balkans.' It's like meat and potatoes.

I think people are isolated because of the nature of human consciousness, and they like it when they feel the connection between themselves and someone else.

It's a very dangerous and lonely thing, I imagine, to be a spy: to have friendships that are deceptions, that are not honest.

It's lonely. That's why, in many ways, the CIA is the world's biggest dating agency, I think. I imagine it's much like two actors that get married because they understand that universe. You know, I'm pretty sure the agency's divorce rate is rather high.

For me, I value connection a lot, talking to people and connecting. Don't get me wrong: I enjoy having my own time, but I think it's really important to have that connection, so living on Mars would be a struggle for me.

Loneliness is different than isolation and solitude. Loneliness is a subjective feeling where the connections we need are greater than the connections we have. In the gap, we experience loneliness. It's distinct from the objective state of isolation, which is determined by the number of people around you.

No man is an island; but some are peninsulas.

We are awakening from the dream of isolation, from the dream of loneliness, and it's a terrible shock.

. . . clumsiness is often mated with a love of solitude.

Lately he'd been seen going out less and less, becoming that strangest of animals in a small town: a loner.

Isolation must precede true society.

We are lonesome animals. We spend all life trying to be less lonesome.

You couldn't trust anyone or anything that belonged to the world of espionage.

The reason for my starting a diary is that I have no real friend.

I’m just a real loner kind of person, and yeah, kinda dark. But I’m happy. Not sad. I’m just shy and nervous.

it is the ordinary lot of people to have no friends if they themselves care for nobody

Isolation is a blind alley....Nothing on the planet grows except by convergence.

Men who no longer can make sure of the reality which they feel and experience through talking about it and sharing it with their fellow-men, live in the same nightmare of loneliness and uncertainty which, in a normal world, is the terrible fate of insanity.

Trust me on this: no one is better off alone.

I didn't have any friends at school, didn't want any. I felt better being alone. I sat on a bench and watched the others play and they looked foolish to me.

Maybe the biggest problem with loneliness is that we walk around thinking we're the only ones suffering from it.

The great irony to Dirk [Gently] is that he sees connections in everything, but the one thing he fails and struggles with most is connecting with other people.