Sebastian Faulks
Sebastian Faulks
Sebastian Charles Faulks CBEis a British novelist, journalist and broadcaster. He is best known for his historical novels set in France – The Girl at the Lion d'Or, Birdsong and Charlotte Gray. He has also published novels with a contemporary setting, most recently A Week in December, and a James Bond continuation novel, Devil May Care, as well as a continuation of P.G. Wodehouse's Jeeves series, Jeeves and the Wedding Bells. He is a team captain on BBC Radio 4...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth20 April 1953
lonely struggle organisms
Lonely's like any other organism; competitive and resourceful in the struggle to perpetuate itself.
glee
. . . she read with undifferentiated glee . . .
people alive hardest
One of the hardest things about being alive is being with other people.
way used chosen
I'd never chosen to be alone, but that was the way things had turned out, and I'd grown used to it.
half levels different
We all operate on different levels of awareness. Half the time I don't know what I'm doing.
peace breathe silent
It was entirely silent and I tried to breathe its peace.
feelings alive inexplicable
Gradually the feeling wears off, and I feel swamped again by the inexplicable pettiness of being alive.
stills
My direction? Anywhere. Because one is always nearer by not keeping still.
laughter war men
The men loved jokes, though they had heard each one before. Jack's manner was persuasive; few of them had seen the old stories so well delivered. Jack himeself laughed a little, but he was able to see the effect his performance had on his audience. The noise of their laughter roared like the sea in his ears. He wanted it louder and louder; he wanted them to drown out the war with their laughter. If the could should loud enough, they might bring the world back to its senses; they might laugh loud enough to raise the dead.
years may months
I suppose that each of us may have a great moment in our life, a month, a week a year, when we are most fully what we are meant to be
depression years black
Depression - that limp word for the storm of black panic and half-demented malfunction - had over the years worked itself out in Charlotte's life in a curious pattern. Its onset was often imperceptible: like an assiduous housekeeper locking up a rambling mansion, it noiselessly went about and turned off, one by one, the mind's thousand small accesses to pleasure.
pain shock
The physical shock took away the pain of being.
reflection soul void
I know. I was there. I saw the great void in your soul, and you saw mine.
sake paragraph
He wrote one more paragraph for his own sake, to see what he had to say.