Quote

I couldn't imagine any other way of living, outside of books, outside my work. Which doesn't mean I am not interested in other things, of course - I am interested in many things. But the center, the crux, is always literature.

Mario Vargas Llosa

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Mario Vargas Llosa
Age: 88
Born: 1936
Born: March 28
Dramaturge
Essayist
Film Director
Journalist
Literary Critic
Novelist
Opinion Journalist
Philosopher
Playwright
Politician
Prosaist
Many
Imagine
Mean
Courses
Work
Course
Way
Books
Crux
Always
Literature
Center
Things
Living
Interested
Doesn
Couldn
Book
Outside

More quotes by Mario Vargas Llosa

Image
If you are killed because you are a writer, that's the maximum expression of respect, you know.
Mario Vargas Llosa
Image
It is rare and almost impossible for a novel to have only one narrator.
Mario Vargas Llosa
Image
I write because I'm unhappy. I write because it's a way of fighting unhappiness.
Mario Vargas Llosa
Image
I completely believe that - literature for me is a way of life. That's probably true of all writers or all artists. I think in the end this kind of activity absorbs one in such a way that it becomes one's way of life.
Mario Vargas Llosa
Image
The secret to happiness, at least to peace of mind, is knowing how to separate sex from love. And, if possible, eliminating romantic love from your life, which is the love that makes you suffer. That way, I assure you, you live with greater tranquility and enjoy things more.
Mario Vargas Llosa
Image
The truths that seem most truthful, if you look at them from all sides, if you look at them close up, turn out to be either half truths or lies.
Mario Vargas Llosa
Image
Liberty is inseparable from social justice, and those who dissociate them, sacrificing the first with the purpose of attaining the second more quickly, are the true barbarians of our time.
Mario Vargas Llosa
Image
North American society could not have reached its state of high development and modernity had it not been an open society.
Mario Vargas Llosa
Image
There are many things behind a good novel, but in particular there is a lot of work - a lot of patience, a lot of stubbornness, and a critical spirit.
Mario Vargas Llosa
Image
A novel which persuades us of its truth is true however full of lies it may be
Mario Vargas Llosa
Image
I think in a country like mine, violence is at the root of all human relations.
Mario Vargas Llosa
Image
Even though what I enjoy most is literature, I would not want to live only in a world of fiction, cut off from the rest of life. No - I want to always have a foot in the street, to be inmersed in the activities of my contemporaries, in the times, in the place where I live.
Mario Vargas Llosa
Image
Its easy to know what you want to say, but not to say it
Mario Vargas Llosa
Image
I convinced her that her first loyalty isn't to other people, but to her own feelings.
Mario Vargas Llosa
Image
Reading was such an enrichment of my life. And it was that pleasure that I had as a very young reader probably that is the origin of my vocation.
Mario Vargas Llosa
Image
When I was young, when I started to write, we were totally convinced that literature was a kind of weapon.
Mario Vargas Llosa
Image
But what do I have? The things I'm told and the things I tell, that's all. And as far as I know, that never yet made anyone fly.
Mario Vargas Llosa
Image
A good novel is a conjunction of many factors, the main of which is without a doubt, hard work.
Mario Vargas Llosa
Image
The worst thing that can happen to an artist is to be subsidized by the state. It leads to an intellectual and artistic castration.
Mario Vargas Llosa
Image
Nothing better protects a human being against the stupidity of prejudice, racism, religious or political sectarianism, and exclusivist nationalism than this truth that invariably appears in great literature: that men and women of all nations and places are essentially equal, and only injustice sows among them discrimination, fear, and exploitation.
Mario Vargas Llosa