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I believe in optimism of the will, pessimism of the intellect. But my hope is the people, the society, which is ahead of the government.

Elif Safak

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Elif Safak
Age: 53
Born: 1971
Born: October 25
Author
Journalist
Novelist
Writer
Straßburg
Elif Shafak
Hope
Government
Believe
People
Pessimism
Optimism
Intellect
Ahead
Society

More quotes by Elif Safak

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Moments are born and moments die. For new experiences to come to life, old ones need to wither away.
Elif Safak
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Words are heavy in Turkey, and every writer, every poet and every journalist knows that, because of a word, because of a sentence, because of a tweet or even a retweet, you can be sued, you can be demonized by the media and you can even land in prison.
Elif Safak
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The past lives within the present, and our ancestors breathe through our children.
Elif Safak
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I see two opposite tendencies in Turkish society: people feel demoralized, they lose the interest in politics and retreat to their private lives or they become very angry and even more politicized, and radicalized. Both trends are troublesome.
Elif Safak
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If you want to destroy something in this life, be it an acne, a blemish or the human soul, all you need to do is to surround it with thick walls. It will dry up inside.
Elif Safak
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Our politics is very masculine, very aggressive, and it's very polarizing. And the pace of this development has increased in recent years. Erdogan is, in my eyes, the most polarizing politician in recent Turkish political history.
Elif Safak
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Where there is love, there is bound to be heartache.
Elif Safak
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I see what you mean. It must be a huge relief, and an easy way out, to think the devil is always outside of us. (…) we would stop looking for Sheitan outside and instead focus on ourselves. What we need is sincere self-examination. Not being on the watch for the faults of others.” (p. 257).
Elif Safak
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Feminists are now being vilified in politics, erdogan used to speak more embracingly, saying he was the leader of everyone, whether they voted for him or not. He sounds as if he puts a distance between himself and half the nation.
Elif Safak
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That was the one thing about the rain that likened it to sorrow: You did your best to remain untouched, safe and dry, but if and when you failed, there came a point in which you started seeing the problem less in terms of drops than as an incessant gush, and thereby you decide you might as well get drenched.
Elif Safak
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The digital world is developing with such force and such a pace that you simply can't ban or control it. People want to be globally connected.
Elif Safak
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No matter who we are or where we live, deep inside we all feel incomplete. It's like we have lost something and need to get it back. Just what that something is, most of us never find out. And of those who do, even fewer manage to go out and look for it.
Elif Safak
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perhaps it took a stranger to make a woman like her speak her mind.
Elif Safak
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Almost half of the Turkish population believes it is not legitimate to criticize the government. Interestingly, this correlates with the number of supporters of Erdogan's government.
Elif Safak
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No reason to feel depressed about being depressed. A depression can be a golden opportunity to collect the pieces and build ourselves anew. Global Souls are always on the move, nomads at heart, connected to various cities, commuters between cultures, both from here and everywhere.
Elif Safak
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The words that come out of our mouths do not vanish but are perpetually stored in infinite space, and they will come back to us in due time.
Elif Safak
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If you want to experience eternal illumination, put the past and the future out of your mind and remain within the present moment.
Elif Safak
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Sometimes I feel I have more faith in European ideals than some of my British or French friends. For them, it's a financial burden. For me, Europe is primarily about values, about fundamental rights, freedom, women's rights.
Elif Safak
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I remember a time when it was ok to make fun of politicians and powerful people. Now, it's not ok anymore. We've forgotten how to laugh.
Elif Safak
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Isn't connecting people to distant lands and culture one of the strengths of good literature?
Elif Safak