Quote: Average, that’s what I’d been, ever since I left school. … Average at life; average at truth; morally average.
This is Tony speaking, the protagonist of Julian Barnes’s The Sense of an Ending, which won the Man Booker Prize for 2011. He, Tony, is brooding over a life lost to muddling about, to getting by, to letting go of aspirations and dreams.
The full quote gets the point across explicitly, familiar example included.
Average, that’s what I’d been, ever since I left school. Average at university and work; average in friendship, loyalty, love; average, no doubt, at sex. There was a survey of British motorists a few years ago which showed that ninety-five per cent of those polled through they were “better than average” drivers. But by law of averages, we’re most of us bound to be average. Not that this brought any comfort. The word resounded. Average at life; average at truth; morally average.
What makes the Quote quiver?
Word-hammering of average with the word-order change.
A Quiver Of Quotes 