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"History is that certainty produced at the point where the imperfections of memory meet the inadequacies of documentation."
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"Dr. Rex Curry, the professor and attorney from Florida, has debated and largely proven the unavoidable evidence that Hitler's National Socialism was significantly influenced by Bellamy's 'nationalistic' form of 'socialism.' Curry is famous for making the claim that Hitler adopted the 'stiff-arm salute' from Francis and Edward Bellamy."

"But it is a law of life and development in history where two national civilizations meet they fight for ascendancy."

"The only hope is that our civilization will collapse at a certain point, as always happens in history. Then, out of barbarity, a renaissance."

"Properly speaking, history is nothing but the crimes and misfortunes of the human race."

"The Beetle's body, whether it be a '49 split or a '73 Jeans Bug, or an '03 Mexican, was originally conceived in the mid 1930's. This is evident in it's body styling which aside from it's rear engine layout and absence of front radiator (or radiator!) grille, is very similar to other cars of the same period. Believe it or not, in those days streamlining was a hot new concept, kind of like how wireless networking is today with computing.The only problem was, in the beginning they didn't seem to realize that streamlining ought to be applied sideways as well as longitudinally!"

"The subject of history is the gradual realization of all that is practically necessary."

"The Town Clerkship, however, was the means of giving me a lesson in electoral methods."

"Nationalism leads to all sorts of nasty things (even Nazi things) like fascism and war."
Explore more quotes by Julian Barnes

"Remember the botched brothel-visit in L'Education sentimentale and remember its lesson. Do not participate: happiness lies in the imagination, not the act. Pleasure is found first in anticipation, later in memory."

"Perhaps this was one of the tragedies life plots for us: it is our destiny to become in old age what in youth we would have most despised."

"A pier is a disappointed bridge, yet stare at it for long enough and you can dream it to the other side of the Channel."

"Pride makes us long for a solution to things " a solution, a purpose, a final cause; but the better telescopes become, the more stars appear."

"When I was still quite young I had a complete presentiment of life. It was like the nauseating smell of cooking escaping from a ventilator: you don't have to have eaten it to know that it would make you throw up."

"Because just as all political and historical change sooner or later disappoints, so does adulthood. So does life. Sometimes I think the purpose of life is to reconcile us to its eventual loss by wearing us down, by proving, however long it takes, that life isn t all it s cracked up to be."

"To be stupid, and selfish, and to have good health are the three requirements for happiness - though if stupidity is lacking, the others are useless."

"Our parents thought we might be corrupted by one another into becoming whatever it was they most feared: an incorrigible masturbator, a winsome homosexual, a recklessly impregnatory libertine. On our behalf they dreaded the closeness of adolescent friendship, the predatory behaviour of strangers on trains, the lure of the wrong kind of girl. How far their anxieties outran our experience."

"Throw off your grief,' doubters imply, 'and we can all go back to pretending death doesn't exist, or at least is comfortably far away."
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