"You come into the world alone, and you go out of the world alone, yet it seems to me you are more alone while living than even going and coming"
About this Quote
As an artist, Carr wasn’t just theorizing solitude; she was documenting it. Working on the margins of Canada’s art establishment, often dismissed for her intensity and independence, she knew the social world’s talent for turning difference into isolation. The subtext is about perception: being alive among people doesn’t guarantee contact. It can mean constant translation, performance, compromise - and the exhaustion of realizing those efforts still don’t bridge the gap.
There’s also a modern edge here. Carr anticipates the way public life can amplify privateness: you can be surrounded by noise and still feel unaccompanied. The quote’s power comes from its calm, almost plainspoken cadence, which refuses melodrama while delivering something harsher: solitude isn’t a dramatic exception. It’s the ambient weather of consciousness, thickest not at the threshold moments, but in the long, daily stretch where everyone assumes you’re fine.
Quote Details
| Topic | Loneliness |
|---|---|
| Source | Verified source: Hundreds and Thousands: The Journals of an Artist (Emily Carr, 1966)
Evidence: I wonder will death be much lonelier than life. Life’s an awfully lonesome affair. You can live close against other people yet your lives never touch. You come into the world alone and you go out of the world alone yet it seems to me you are more alone while living than even going and coming. (Chapter: "The Elephant" (1933), entry dated July 16th). This line appears as part of Emily Carr’s journal entry dated July 16, 1933 (section heading: "The Elephant"), and was first published posthumously in the edited volume Hundreds and Thousands: The Journals of an Artist. The Faded Page (Distributed Proofreaders Canada) eBook reproduces the book and states "Date of first publication: 1966" and "Copyright © 1966 Irwin Publishing Inc." The wording in your query matches the text here (note: many secondary quote sites truncate the sentence and/or swap word order; the primary-source phrasing is "going and coming"). Other candidates (1) Hundreds and Thousands (Emily Carr, 2009) compilation97.2% The Journals of Emily Carr Emily Carr. THE ELEPHANT 1933 JULY 16TH , 1933 Once I heard it ... You come into the world... |
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Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Carr, Emily. (2026, February 24). You come into the world alone, and you go out of the world alone, yet it seems to me you are more alone while living than even going and coming. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/you-come-into-the-world-alone-and-you-go-out-of-59337/
Chicago Style
Carr, Emily. "You come into the world alone, and you go out of the world alone, yet it seems to me you are more alone while living than even going and coming." FixQuotes. February 24, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/you-come-into-the-world-alone-and-you-go-out-of-59337/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"You come into the world alone, and you go out of the world alone, yet it seems to me you are more alone while living than even going and coming." FixQuotes, 24 Feb. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/you-come-into-the-world-alone-and-you-go-out-of-59337/. Accessed 2 Mar. 2026.
