To determine not to think of it was but to think of it still, to suffer from it still.
 Marcel Proust, Swann's Way (1913). copy citation

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Author Marcel Proust
Source Swann's Way
Topic suffering thinking
Date 1913
Language English
Reference
Note Translated by C. K. Scott Moncrieff
Weblink http://www.gutenberg.org/files/7178/7178-h/7178-h.htm

Context

“As though this had been a bodily pain, Swann's mind was powerless to alleviate it; in the case of bodily pain, however, since it is independent of the mind, the mind can dwell upon it, can note that it has diminished, that it has momentarily ceased. But with this mental pain, the mind, merely by recalling it, created it afresh. To determine not to think of it was but to think of it still, to suffer from it still. And when, in conversation with his friends, he forgot his sufferings, suddenly a word casually uttered would make him change countenance as a wounded man does when a clumsy hand has touched his aching limb.” source
Original quote

Meaning and analysis

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