“Only solitary men know the full joys of friendship. Others have their family — but to a solitary and an exile his friends are everything.”

—  Willa Cather , book Shadows on the Rock

Shadows on the Rock (1931), Book III, Ch. 5

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Only solitary men know the full joys of friendship. Others have their family — but to a solitary and an exile his frien…" by Willa Cather?
Willa Cather photo
Willa Cather 99
American writer and novelist 1873–1947

Related quotes

Thomas Carlyle photo

“No solitary miscreant, scarcely any solitary maniac, would venture on such actions and imaginations, as large communities of sane men have, in such circumstances, entertained as sound wisdom.”

Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) Scottish philosopher, satirical writer, essayist, historian and teacher

1820s, Signs of the Times (1829)

Eric Hoffer photo

“With some people solitariness is an escape not from others but from themselves. For they see in the eyes of others only a reflection of themselves.”

Eric Hoffer (1898–1983) American philosopher

Section 211
The Passionate State Of Mind, and Other Aphorisms (1955)

“Photography is solitary work. There is emulation. It is interesting to know what other people do. Even so, writers do not read everything that is published. A painter does not look at everything. You have to choose. It’s reality, it’s life that is important. We shouldn’t be sniffing around each other all the time, looking….”

Henri Cartier-Bresson (1908–2004) French photographer

Source: Henri Cartier-Bresson: Interviews and Conversations, 1951-1998, The Main Thing Is Looking: Interview with Alain Desvergnes (1979), p. 75

Henry James photo

“He is outside of everything, and an alien everywhere. He is an aesthetic solitary. His beautiful, light imagination is the wing that on the autumn evening just brushes the dusky window.”

Henry James (1843–1916) American novelist, short story author, and literary critic

"Nathaniel Hawthorne" in Library of the World's Best Literature, vol. XII (1897), ed. Charles Dudley Warner.

Nassim Nicholas Taleb photo

“Decomposition, for most, starts when they leave the free, social, and uncorrupted college life for the solitary confinement of professions and nuclear families.”

Nassim Nicholas Taleb book The Bed of Procrustes: Philosophical and Practical Aphorisms

Source: The Bed of Procrustes: Philosophical and Practical Aphorisms (2010), p. 41

Saul Bellow photo

“With one long breath, caught and held in his chest, he fought his sadness over his solitary life. Don't cry, you idiot! Live or die, but don't poison everything…”

Saul Bellow book Herzog

Source: Herzog

Bell Hooks photo

“Knowing how to be solitary is central to the art of loving. When we can be alone, we can be with others without using them as a means of escape.”

Bell Hooks (1952) American author, feminist, and social activist
Edward Young photo

“Woes cluster. Rare are solitary woes;
They love a train, they tread each other’s heel.”

Edward Young Night-Thoughts

Source: Night-Thoughts (1742–1745), Night III, Line 63.

Henry Clay photo

“Precedents deliberately established by wise men are entitled to great weight. They are evidence of truth, but only evidence…But a solitary precedent…which has never been reexamined, cannot be conclusive.”

Henry Clay (1777–1852) American politician from Kentucky

Speech, Senate (18 February 1835).

Georges Duhamel photo

“Books are the friends of solitude. They develop individuality and freedom. In solitary reading a man who is seeking himself has some chance of finding himself.”

Georges Duhamel (1884–1966) French writer

Source: Défense des Lettres [In Defense of Letters] (1937), p. 42

Related topics