Quote

To write a novel may be pure pleasure. To live a novel presents certain difficulties. As for reading a novel, I do my best to get out of it.

Karl Kraus

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Karl Kraus
Age: 62 †
Born: 1874
Born: March 28
Died: 1936
Died: June 12
Essayist
Journalist
Literary Critic
Playwright
Poet
Translator
Writer
Jicin
Certain
Presents
May
Difficulties
Best
Difficulty
Live
Pure
Writing
Novel
Pleasure
Reading
Write

More quotes by Karl Kraus

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Sentimental irony is a dog that bays at the moon while pissing on graves.
Karl Kraus
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That an author takes a bow is not humility but presumption. What does the paleface want on the stage afterwards? But before the performance he had even less business there--and paying him royalties is equivalent to cheating the actors.
Karl Kraus
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When I want to go to sleep, I must first get a whole menagerie of voices to shut up. You wouldn't believe what a racket they make in my room.
Karl Kraus
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There are women who are not beautiful but only look that way.
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It is better not to express what one means than to express what one does not mean.
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In Berlin, things are serious but not hopeless. In Vienna, they are hopeless but not serious.
Karl Kraus
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A fine world in which man reproaches woman with fulfilling his heart's desire!
Karl Kraus
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This is something that I cannot get over -- that a whole line could be written by half a man, that a work could be built on the quicksand of a character.
Karl Kraus
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To me all men are equal: there are jackasses everywhere, and I have the same contempt for them all.
Karl Kraus
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Chastity always takes its toll. In some it produces pimples in others, sex laws.
Karl Kraus
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What torture, this life in society! Often someone is obliging enough to offer me a light, and in order to oblige him I have to fish a cigarette out of my pocket.
Karl Kraus
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Sorrento, August. For two weeks now I haven't heard a German word or understood an Italian one. This way one can manage to live with people everything goes like clockwork and no irksome misunderstanding can arise.
Karl Kraus
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Let language be the divining rod that finds the sources of thought.
Karl Kraus
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The agitator seizes the word. The artist is seized by it.
Karl Kraus
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In a well-run mental household there ought to be a thorough cleaning at the threshold of consciousness a few times a year.
Karl Kraus
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Jealousy is a dog's bark which attracts thieves.
Karl Kraus
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Experiences are savings which a miser puts aside. Wisdom is an inheritance which a wastrel cannot exhaust.
Karl Kraus
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I and life: The case was settled chivalrously. The opponents parted without having made up.
Karl Kraus
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The pimp is the executive organ of immorality. The executive organ of morality is the blackmailer.
Karl Kraus
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Medicine: Your money and your life!
Karl Kraus