# Quote — James Baldwin, Tell Me How Long the Train's Been Gone

> Everyone wishes to be loved, but, in the event, nearly no one can bear it. Everyone desires love but also finds it impossible to believe that he deserves it.

- Author: [James Baldwin](https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-baldwin.md)
- Book: [Tell Me How Long the Train's Been Gone](https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-baldwin/tell-me-how-long-the-trains-been-gone.md)
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/James_Baldwin#Tell_Me_How_Long_the_Train's_Been_Gone_(1968)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-baldwin/tell-me-how-long-the-trains-been-gone/everyone-wishes-to-be-loved

## More from this book

> Some moments in a life, and they needn’t be very long or seem very important, can make up for so much in that life; can redeem, justify, that pain, that bewilderment, with which one lives, and invest one with the courage not only to endure it, but to profit from it; some moments teach one the price of the human connection: if one can live with one’s own pain, then one respects the pain of others, and so, briefly, but transcendentally, we can release each other from pain.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-baldwin/tell-me-how-long-the-trains-been-gone/some-moments-in-a-life.md)

> Now, for the first time, I began to be aware of my heart, the heart itself: and with this awareness, conscious terror came. I realized that I knew nothing whatever about the way we are put together; and I realized that what I did not know might be in the process of killing me.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-baldwin/tell-me-how-long-the-trains-been-gone/now-for-the.md)

> a child’s major attention has to be concentrated on how to fit into a world which, with every passing hour, reveals itself as merciless.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-baldwin/tell-me-how-long-the-trains-been-gone/a-childs-major.md)