"It was not socialism or communism or Islamism. It was romanticism. There is no more incandescent passion than love in a time of revolution."

Ian McDonald Literature See all quotes by Ian McDonald →

React to this quote

More by Ian McDonald

“Nationalism, then Islamism, both twentieth-century inventions, destroyed the Greek civilization in Egypt that had endured for three thousand years.”

“He has no belief—faith is beneath his dignity—but he enjoys the designed madness of religion.”

“A chilly piety leaked into the air.”

“Ayşe Erkoç learned long ago that the secret of doing anything illicit in Istanbul is to do it in full public gaze in the clear light of day. No one ever questions the legitimacy of the blatant.”

“Legends should stay legends; otherwise they just become history, when the natural course of things is the other way around, from history to legend.”

“It was fate, and being angry at fate was as futile as being angry at the weather.”

Resonant Thoughts

"Maybe I was destined to forever fall in love with people I couldn’t have. Maybe there’s a whole assortment of impossible people waiting for me to find them. Waiting to make me feel the same impossibil…"

— Carol Rifka Brunt

Literature1970

#love

"Then saw I truly that it is more worship to God, and more very delight, that we faithfully pray to Himself of His Goodness and cleave thereunto by His Grace, with true understanding, and steadfast by …"

— Julian of Norwich

Literature

#love

"We stood there and talked while Elizabeth sipped her milk daintily and she told me all about Tomorrow. The Woman had told her that Tomorrow never comes, but Elizabeth knows better. It will come someti…"

— Lucy Maud Montgomery

Literature1874–1942

#time

"Do not excuse yourselves, beloved sirs, and judges, that you are the servants of the emperor; this will not acquit you in the day of vengeance. It availed Pilate nothing that he crucified Christ in th…"

— Menno Simons

Religion1496–1561

#love