Desperately seeking quote..

February 6, 2011 9:41 AM

Looking for a quote about traveling. Something about the purpose of traveling the globe over is to come back to the place you came from and see it with new eyes or anew. Does that ring a bell to anyone? Much thanks in advance..
posted by ruelle to Writing & Language (8 answers total)

Maybe: "There is nothing like returning to a place that remains unchanged to find the ways in which you yourself have altered." (Nelson Mandela).
posted by karminai at 9:44 AM on February 6, 2011

Best answer: We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.

- Eliot, The Wasteland
posted by beanie at 9:48 AM on February 6, 2011 [8 favorites]

Best answer: Four Quartets
posted by beanie at 9:50 AM on February 6, 2011 [1 favorite]

"The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes," Marcel Proust
posted by Listener at 9:55 AM on February 6, 2011 [3 favorites]

“You don't have to travel around the world to understand that the sky is blue everywhere” Goethe
posted by nickrussell at 10:30 AM on February 6, 2011

There's also the frequently quoted line from Kipling: "What should they know of England who only England know?" (English Flag)
posted by Chicken Boolean at 10:49 AM on February 6, 2011 [1 favorite]

Yes, from Eliot's "Little Gidding" the last paragraph of the last of the Four Quartets in the link provided by beanie. It's a wonderful beautiful poem -- especially that bit.
posted by rhartong at 10:50 AM on February 6, 2011

Response by poster: Thank you all so much :)
posted by ruelle at 10:58 AM on February 6, 2011