“I feel half faded away like some figure in the background of an old picture.”
Source: A Severed Head
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Iris Murdoch61
British writer and philosopher 1919–1999Related quotes
“Philosophies, like old soldiers, do not die, they merely fade away.”
Pragmatism and the Outlook of Modern Science (1966)
“It's better to fade away like an old soldier than to burn out.”
John Lennon (1940–1980) English singer and songwriter
Playboy interview (1980)
Context: It's better to fade away like an old soldier than to burn out. I don't appreciate worship of dead Sid Vicious or of dead James Dean or of dead John Wayne. It's the same thing. Making Sid Vicious a hero, Jim Morrison — it's garbage to me. I worship the people who survive. Gloria Swanson, Greta Garbo.
Douglas MacArthur (1880–1964) U.S. Army general of the army, field marshal of the Army of the Philippines
Audio clip (ogg format)
1950s, Farewell address to Congress (1951)
Context: I am closing my 52 years of military service. When I joined the Army, even before the turn of the century, it was the fulfillment of all of my boyish hopes and dreams. The world has turned over many times since I took the oath on the plain at West Point, and the hopes and dreams have long since vanished, but I still remember the refrain of one of the most popular barrack ballads of that day which proclaimed most proudly that "old soldiers never die; they just fade away."
And like the old soldier of that ballad, I now close my military career and just fade away, an old soldier who tried to do his duty as God gave him the light to see that duty.
Kenneth Noland (1924–2010) American artist
Kenneth Noland, pp. 23-24
Conversation with Karen Wilkin' (1986-1988)
“I didn’t know that painters and writers retired. They’re like soldiers – they just fade away.”
Lawrence Ferlinghetti (1919) American artist, writer and activist