Quote

what's the matter? he asked nothing what do you want me to do for you? i want you to be old. ten years older. twenty years older what she meant was: i want you to be weak. as weak as i am.

Milan Kundera

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Milan Kundera
Age: 95
Born: 1929
Born: April 1
Author
Novelist
Playwright
Poet
Screenwriter
Translator
University Teacher
Writer
Brünn
Years
Twenties
Ten
Older
Meant
Weak
Asked
Nothing
Matter
Twenty

More quotes by Milan Kundera

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He was no longer quite sure whether anything he had ever thought or felt was truly his own property, or whether his thoughts were merely a common part of the world’s store of ideas which had always existed ready-made and which people only borrowed, like books from a library.
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she loved to walk down the street with a book under her arm. It had the same significance for her as an elegant cane for the dandy a century ago. It differentiated her from others.
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The sound of laughter is like the vaulted dome of a temple of happiness.
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Through the air floated only important words, and Flajsman said to himself that love has but one true measure, and that is death. At the end of true love is death, and only the love that ends in death is love.
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For the body is temporal and thought is eternal and the shimmering essence of flame is an image of thought.
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Only animals were not expelled from Paradise.
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In the realm of totalitarian kitsch, all answers are given in advance and preclude any questions.
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Only the most naive of questions are truly serious.
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Remembering now all those farewells (fake farewells, worked-up farewells), Irena thinks: a person who messes up her goodbyes shouldn’t expect much from her re-unions.
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A worker may be the hammer's master, but the hammer still prevails. A tool knows exactly how it is meant to be handled, while the user of the tool can only have an approximate idea.
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In her presence I could dare everything: sincerity, emotion, pathos.
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The stupidity of people comes from having an answer for everything. The wisdom of the novel comes from having a question for everything.
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Art arises from sources other than logic. (p.32)
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And therein lies the whole of man's plight. Human time does not turn in a circle it runs ahead in a straight line. That is why man cannot be happy: happiness is the longing for repetition.
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Culture is perishing in overproduction, in an avalanche of words, in the madness of quantity.
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But then he told himself: What does it really mean to be useful? Today's world, just as it is, contains the sum of the utility of all people of all times. Which implies: The highest morality consists in being useless.
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Ah, ladies and gentlemen, a man lives a sad life when he cannot take anything or anyone seriously.
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In the love poetry of every age, the woman longs to be weighed down by the man's body.
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Joking is a barrier between man and the world. Joking is the enemy of love and poetry.
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Once her love had been publicized, it would gain weight, become a burden.
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