Surrender to a logic more powerful than reason. J. G. Ballard More Quotes by J. G. Ballard More Quotes From J. G. Ballard A ton of Proust isn’t worth an ounce of Ray Bradbury. J. G. Ballard bradbury proust rays Sex times technology equals the future. J. G. Ballard technology sex People nowadays like to be together not in the old-fashioned way of, say, mingling on the piazza of an Italian Renaissance city, but, instead, huddled together in traffic jams, bus queues, on escalators and so on. It's a new kind of togetherness which may seem totally alien, but it's the togetherness of modern technology. J. G. Ballard technology italian cities Nagasaki destroyed by the magic of science is the nearest man has yet approached to the realization of dreams that even during the safe immobility of sleep are accustomed to develop into nightmares of anxiety. J. G. Ballard dream sleep men Given that external reality is a fiction, the writer's role is almost superfluous. He does not need to invent the fiction because it is already there. J. G. Ballard doe writing reality The suburbs dream of violence. J. G. Ballard dream america world It seems to me that what most of us have to fear for the future is not that something terrible is going to happen, but rather that nothing is going to happen... I could sum up the future in one word, and that word is boring. The future is going to be boring. J. G. Ballard boring terrible happens The geometry of landscape and situation seems to create its own systems of time, the sense of a dynamic element which is cinematizing the events of the canvas, translating a posture or ceremony into dynamic terms. The greatest movie of the 20th century is the Mona Lisa, just as the greatest novel is Gray's Anatomy. J. G. Ballard greatest-movie events time Trying to exhaust himself, Vaughan devised an endless almanac of terrifying wounds and insane collisions: The lungs of elderly men punctured by door-handles; the chests of young women impaled on steering-columns; the cheek of handsome youths torn on the chromium latches of quarter-lights. To Vaughan, these wounds formed the key to a new sexuality, born from a perverse technology. The images of these wounds hung in the gallery of his mind, like exhibits in the museum of a slaughterhouse. J. G. Ballard technology keys men I take for granted that for the imaginative writer, the exercise of the imagination is part of the basic process of coping with reality, just as actors need to act all the time to make up for some deficiency in their sense of themselves. J. G. Ballard imagination exercise reality In the post-Warhol era a single gesture such as uncrossing one's legs will have more significance than all the pages in War and Peace. J. G. Ballard gestures legs war When the modern movement began, starting perhaps with the paintings of Manet and the poetry of Baudelaire and Rimbaud, what distinguished the modern movement was the enormous honesty that writers, painters and playwrights displayed about themselves. The bourgeois novel flinches from such notions. J. G. Ballard painting movement honesty Most writers flinch at the thought of being completely honest about themselves. So absolute honesty is what marks the true modern. J. G. Ballard modern mark honesty Most English writers are not interested in change but in the social novel. That demands a static backdrop. I'm intensely interested in change - probably as a matter of self-preservation. What the hell is going to happen next? J. G. Ballard demand self matter I don't think any particular painters have inspired me, except in a general sense. It was more a matter of corroboration. The visual arts, from Manet onwards, seemed far more open to change and experiment than the novel, though that's only partly the fault of the writers. There's something about the novel that resists innovation. J. G. Ballard innovation art thinking Yes, sometimes I think that all my writing is nothing more than the compensatory work of a frustrated painter. J. G. Ballard frustrated writing thinking Perhaps the future belongs to magic, and it's we women who control magic. J. G. Ballard magic I felt the pressure of imagination against the doors of my mind was so great that they were going to burst. J. G. Ballard imagination mind doors But I wouldn't recommend writing. You can be a successful writer and never meet another soul. I'm not sure that's a good thing. J. G. Ballard soul successful writing The American Dream has run out of gas. The car has stopped. It no longer supplies the world with its images, its dreams, its fantasies. No more. It's over. It supplies the world with its nightmares now: the Kennedy assassination, Watergate, Vietnam. J. G. Ballard dream running america
