Alice Sebold Quotes

Why you do something is always kind of a mystery to me.

I can never say 'why' about anything I do. I suppose I can say 'how' and 'when' and 'what.' But 'why' is impenetrable to me.

There's nothing wrong with not understanding yourself.

Chekhov understood that people are mysterious and can't be reduced to what we nowadays call 'motivation.'

There is really nothing more to say-except why. But since why is difficult to handle, one must take refuge in how.

I still haven’t figured it out completely.

Sometimes, I'm not sure why I wind up doing some of the things I do.

I don't feel it incumbent on me to make sense of everything.

Books say: She did this because. Life says: She did this. Books are where things are explained to you; life is where things aren't. I'm not surprised some people prefer books.

Answers are a perilous grip on the universe. They can appear sensible yet explain nothing.

Quid est ergo tempus? Si nemo ex me quaerat, scio; si quaerenti explicare velim, nescio. What, then, is time? I know well enough what it is, provided that nobodyasksme; but if Iamasked what it is and try to explain, I am baffled.

I think of how and why and what happened and the thoughts come easily, but the answers don't.

Our ignorance can be divided into problems and mysteries. When we face a problem, we may not know its solution, but we have insight, increasing knowledge, and an inkling of what we are looking for. When we face a mystery, however, we can only stare in wonder and bewilderment, not knowing what an explanation would even look like.

I scarcely know the meaning of your question; much less can I answer it.

I don't have any of the answers, son. Never did. All I can do is keep asking the questions. Keep trying to make sense of why people do what they do.

He resented such questions as people do who have thought a great deal about them. The superficial and slipshod have ready answers, but those looking this complex life straight in the eye acquire a wealth of perception so composed of delicately balanced contradictions that they dread, or resent, the call to couch any part of it in a bland generalization. The vanity (if not outrage) of trying to cage this dance of atoms in a single definition may give the weariness of age with the cry of youth for answers the appearance of boredom.

Establish enigmas, not explanations.

True' and 'false' are the evasions of people who never want to arrive at a decision. Truth is something without end.

If you don't know what you want, you'll probably get what somebody else wants.

Creativity helps us realize that we don't have to understand everything. We can enjoy something -feel it and use it- without ever fully comprehending it.

I wouldn't like to live in a world where everything's as cut-and-dried as most people think it is

I am very Aristotelian in approach - not in detail - so I always find I'm saying things that get people frustrated like 'It's a matter of balance and judgement'. To a lot of philosophers these are terrible words because they're admitting of vagueness and uncertainty. The more I've done philosophy, the more I've become convinced that that is the way it is.

I asked the Zebra, are you black with white stripes? Or white with black stripes? And the zebra asked me, Are you good with bad habits? Or are you bad with good habits? Are you noisy with quiet times? Or are you quiet with noisy times? Are you happy with some sad days? Or are you sad with some happy days? Are you neat with some sloppy ways? Or are you sloppy with some neat ways? And on and on and on and on and on and on he went. I’ll never ask a zebra about stripes...again.

With our human limitations we're not always able to understand the explanations.

Because it is so hard, in any life, to believe in what you can’t fully understand.