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This morning it occurred to me for the first time that my body, my faithful companion and friend, truer and better known to me than my own soul, may be after all only a sly beast who will end by devouring his master.
Marguerite Yourcenar
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Marguerite Yourcenar
Age: 84 †
Born: 1903
Born: June 7
Died: 1987
Died: December 17
Essayist
Novelist
Poet
Translator
University Teacher
Writer
Brussels
Belgium
Marguerite Antoinette Jeanne Marie Ghislaine Cleenewerck de Crayencour
Yourcenar
Marguerite Cleenewerck de Crayencour
Marguerite de Crayencour
Body
Beast
May
Faithful
Soul
Master
Better
Masters
Sly
Firsts
Friend
Devouring
First
Morning
Truer
Time
Known
Occurred
Ends
Companion
More quotes by Marguerite Yourcenar
Since man, fragment of the universe, is governed by the same laws that preside over the heavens, it is by no means absurd to search there above for the themes of our lives, for those frigid sympathies that participate in our achievements as well as our blunderings.
Marguerite Yourcenar
All happiness is a form of innocence.
Marguerite Yourcenar
Do not mistake me. I am not yet weak enough to yield to fearful imaginings, which are almost as absurd as illusions of hope, and are certainly harder to bear. If I must deceive myself, I should prefer to stay on the side of confidence, for I shall lose no more there and shall suffer less.
Marguerite Yourcenar
Our true birthplace is that in which we cast for the first time an intelligent eye on ourselves. My first homelands were my books.
Marguerite Yourcenar
Of all our games, love's play is the only one which threatens to unsettle the soul.
Marguerite Yourcenar
Books are not life, only its ashes.
Marguerite Yourcenar
Everything that we do affects our fate for better or for worse. The circumstances into which we are born also exert a tremendous influence we come into the world with debits and credits for which we are not responsible already posted to our account: this teaches us humility.
Marguerite Yourcenar
Leaving behind books is even more beautiful — there are far too many children.
Marguerite Yourcenar
Everything turns out to be valuable that one does for one’s self without thought of profit.
Marguerite Yourcenar
Writing is a perpetual choice between a thousand expressions, none of which satisfies me, none of which, above all, satisfies me without the others. Yet I ought to know that only music permits a succession of chords.
Marguerite Yourcenar
A touch of madness is, I think, almost always necessary for constructing a destiny.
Marguerite Yourcenar
Any truth creates a scandal.
Marguerite Yourcenar
The written word has taught me to listen to the human voice, much as the great unchanging statues have taught me to appreciate bodily motions.
Marguerite Yourcenar
He had reached that moment in life, different for each one of us, when a man abandonds himself to his demon or to his genius, following a mysterious law which bids him either to destroy or outdo himself.
Marguerite Yourcenar
Cruelty is the luxury of those who have nothing to do, like drugs or racing stables.
Marguerite Yourcenar
A being afire with life cannot foresee death in fact, by each of his deeds he denies that death exists.
Marguerite Yourcenar
I could say that all my books were conceived by the time I was twenty, although they were not to be written for another thirty or forty years. But perhaps this is true of most writers—the emotional storage is done very early on.
Marguerite Yourcenar
Translating is writing.
Marguerite Yourcenar
The true birthplace is that wherein for the first time one looks intelligently upon oneself my first homelands have been books, and to a lesser degree schools.
Marguerite Yourcenar
I have never seasoned a truth with the sauce of a lie in order to digest it more easily
Marguerite Yourcenar