Great Throughts Treasury

"The next day was, for Emma, a dismal one. Everything seemed enveloped in a black atmosphere that hovered indistinctly over the exterior of things, and sorrow rushed into her soul, moaning softly like the winter wind in abandoned manor houses. It was the sort of reverie you sink into over something that will never return again, the lassitude that overcomes you with each thing that is finished, the pain you suffer when any habitual motion is stopped, when a prolonged vibration abruptly ceases."

"The next day, for Emma, was like a funeral. Everything seemed to be wrapped in a sort of black atmosphere which floated confusedly about the exterior of things, and grief plunged into the deep places of her soul, making soft moan, like the wintry wind in some deserted chateau. She was dreaming the dreams that come to one when one has bade farewell to something that will never return, the lassitude that comes over one when something is finally over and done with- the pain, in a word, which accompanies the interruption of a habit, the sudden cessation of a prolonged vibration."

"The night was dark. A few drops of rain were falling. She breathed in the damp wind that blew cool against her eyelids. The dance music was still thrumming in her ears, and she tried to keep awake in order to prolong the illusion of a luxurious existence to which she would soon have to say farewell."

"The one way of tolerating existence is to lose oneself in literature as in a perpetual orgy."

"The pleasures that he had promised himself did not come to him; and when he had exhausted a circulating library, gone over the collections in the Louvre, and been at the theatre a great many nights in succession, he sank into the lowest depths of idleness."

"The principal thing in this world is to keep one's soul aloft."

"The public wants work which flatters its illusions."

"The only way to avoid being unhappy is to close yourself up in Art and to count for nothing all the rest."

"The science of psychology will remain where it lies; that is to say in shadows and folly, as long as it has no exact nomenclature, so long as it is allowed to use the same expression to signify the most diverse ideas. When they confuse categories, adieu, morale!"

"The sentimental songs she sang in music class were all about little angels with golden wings, madonnas, lagoons, gondoliers -- mawkish compositions that allowed her to glimpse, through the silliness of the words and the indiscretions of the music, the alluring, phantasmagoric realm of genuine feeling."

"The sense of the grotesque has restrained me from an inclination towards a disorderly life. I maintain that cynicism borders on chastity."

"The smooth folds of her dress concealed a tumultuous heart, and her modest lips told nothing of her torment. She was in love."

"The smell of melted butter penetrated through the walls when he saw patients, just as in the kitchen one could hear the people coughing in the consulting room and recounting their histories."

"The sight of so many ruins destroys any desire to build shanties; all this ancient dust makes one indifferent to fame."

"The true poet for me is a priest. As soon as he dons the cassock, he must leave his family."

"The whole dream of democracy is to raise the proletarian to the level of stupidity attained by the bourgeois."

"The truth is that fullness of soul can sometimes overflow in utter vapidity of language, for none of us can ever express the exact measure of his needs or his thoughts or his sorrows; and human speech is like a cracked kettle on which we tap crude rhythms for bears to dance to, while we long to make music that will melt the stars."

"The wind blew very hard that day and snatched her petticoat away!"

"Then gradually her ideas took definite shape, and, sitting on the grass that she dug up with little prods of her sunshade, Emma repeated to herself, "Good heavens! Why did I marry?""

"The writer must wade into life as into the sea, but only up to the navel."

"Then there was silence. They looked at each other, and their thoughts, mingling in the same anguish of mind, clung closely to one another like two throbbing bosoms."

"Then they wondered if there were men in the stars. Why not? And as creation is harmonious, the inhabitants of Sirius ought to be huge, those of Mars middle-sized, those of Venus very small. Unless it is the same everywhere. There are businessmen, police up there; people trade, fight, dethrone their kings."

"The world is going to become bloody stupid and from now on will be a very boring place. We?re lucky to be living now."

"Then, noticing on one of the shelves a volume of Hugo and another of Lamartine, he broke out into sarcastic criticisms of the romantic school. These poets had neither good sense nor correctness, and, above all, were not French! He plumed himself on his knowledge of the language, and analysed the most beautiful phrases with that snarling severity, that academic taste which persons of playful disposition exhibit when they are discussing serious art."

"There are neither good nor bad subjects. From the point of view of pure Art, you could almost establish it as an axiom that the subject is irrelevant, style itself being an absolute manner of seeing things."

"There are some men whose only mission among others is to act as intermediaries; one crosses them like bridges and keeps going."

"There are two infinities that confuse me: the one in my soul devours me; the one around me will crush me."

"There are three things in the world I love most: the sea, Hamlet, and Don Giovanni."

"There comes a point at which you stop writing and think all the more."

"There is not a particle of life which does not bear poetry within it."

"There is no truth except in its relation, that is to say, the fashion in which we perceive the objects."

"There isn't a bourgeois alive who in the ferment of his youth, if only for a day or for a minute, hasn't thought himself capable of boundless passions and noble exploits. The sorriest little woman-chaser has dreamed of Oriental queens; in a corner of every notary's heart lie the moldy remains of a poet."

"There was a silence. They looked at each other; and their thoughts clung together in their common anguish like two throbbing hearts."

"There was always an uncertain promise dangling in the future like a golden fruit hanging from some fantastic bough."

"Those around him were students like himself. They talked about their professors, and about their mistresses. Much he cared about professors! Had he a mistress? To avoid being a witness of their enjoyment, he came as late as possible."

"Though she had no one to write to, she had bought herself a blotter, a writing case, a pen and envelopes; she would dust off her whatnot, look at herself in the mirror, take up a book, and then begin to daydream and let it fall to her lap? She wanted to die. And she wanted to live in Paris."

"Thought is the greatest of pleasures ?pleasure itself is only imagination?have you ever enjoyed anything more than your dreams?"

"Through the forest he pursued the she-monster whose tail coiled over the dead leaves like a silver stream; and he came to a meadow where women, with the hindquarters of dragons, stood around a great fire, raised on the tips of their tails. The moon shone red as blood in a pale circle and their scarlet tongues, formed like fishing harpoons, stretched out, curling to the edge of the flame."

"To be simple is no small matter."

"To return to antiquity [in literature]: that has been done. To return to the Middle Ages: that too has been done. Remains the present day. But the ground is shaky: so where can you set the foundations? An answer to this question must be found if one is to produce anything vital and hence lasting. All this disturbs me so much that I no longer like to be spoken to about it."

"There, at the top of the table, alone amongst all these women, stooped over his ample plateful, with his napkin tied around his neck like a child, an old man sat eating, drips of gravy dribbling gravy from him lips. His eyes were bloodshot and he had a little pigtail tied up with a black ribbon. This was the Marquis' father-in-law... he had led a... Read more tumultuous life of debauchery and dueling, of wagers made and women abducted, had squandered his fortune and terrified his whole family... Emma's eyes kept coming back to this old man with the sagging lips, as though to something wonderfully majestic. He had lived at court and slept in the bed of a queen!"

"There was an air of indifference about them, a calm produced by the gratification of every passion; and through their manners were suave, one could sense beneath them that special brutality which comes from the habit of breaking down half-hearted resistances that keep one fit and tickle one?s vanity?the handling of blooded horses, the pursuit of loose women."

"This haze of blood must subside, the palace must collapse under the weight of the riches it conceals, the orgy must finish and the time comes to awaken."

"This was how they wished they had been: each was creating an ideal into which he was now fitting his past life."

"Travel makes one modest. You see what a tiny place you occupy in the world."

"Was she serious when she spoke thus? Doubtless Emma herself could not have told, deeply conscious as she was of the alluring danger and of the need to repel it, and, gazing at him with compassion in her eyes, she gently repelled the shy caresses which his tremulous hands essayed."

"We have all been beaten! Each one has to bear his misfortune! Resign yourself!"

"We must laugh and cry, enjoy and suffer, in a word, vibrate to our full capacity... That's what being really human means."

"We should not touch our idols: their gilding will remain on our hands."

"We must not touch our idols; the gilt sticks to our fingers."