Quotes from book

Couples

“Sex is like money; only too much is enough.”

John Updike book Couples

Source: Couples (1968), Ch. 5

“It is not difficult to deceive the first time, for the deceived possesses no antibodies; unvaccinated by suspicion, she overlooks latenesses, accepts absurd excuses, permits the flimsiest patchings to repair great rents in the quotidian.”

John Updike book Couples

Source: Couples (1968), Ch. 2

“An affair wants to spill, to share its glory with the world. No act is so private it does not seek applause.”

John Updike book Couples

Source: Couples (1968), Ch. 2

“By the time a partnership dissolves, it has dissolved.”

John Updike book Couples

Source: Couples (1968), Ch. 5

“Every marriage tends to consist of an aristocrat and a peasant. Of a teacher and a learner.”

John Updike book Couples

Source: Couples (1968), Ch. 1

“The first breath of adultery is the freest; after it, constraints aping marriage develop.”

John Updike book Couples

Source: Couples (1968), Ch. 5