Quote

Poetry and prison have always been neighbors.

Roberto Bolano

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Roberto Bolano
Age: 50 †
Born: 1953
Born: April 28
Died: 2003
Died: July 16
Journalist
Literary Critic
Novelist
Poet
Writer
Santiago
Chile
Ay
Neighbors
Neighbor
Prison
Poetry
Always

More quotes by Roberto Bolano

Image
Literature is a vast forest and the masterpieces are the lakes, the towering trees or strange trees, the lovely, eloquent flowers, the hidden caves, but a forest is also made up of ordinary trees, patches of grass, puddles, clinging vines, mushrooms, and little wildflowers.
Roberto Bolano
Image
…I realized my happiness was artificial. I felt happy because I saw the others were happy and because I knew I should feel happy, but I wasn't really happy.
Roberto Bolano
Image
Literature is the product of a strange rain of blood, sweat, semen, and tears.
Roberto Bolano
Image
Nothing happened today. And if anything did, I’d rather not talk about it, because I didn’t understand it.
Roberto Bolano
Image
Coincidence obeys no laws and if it does we don't know what they are. Coincidence, if you'll permit me the simile, is like the manifestation of God at every moment on our planet. A senseless God making senseless gestures at his senseless creatures. In that hurricane, in that osseous implosion, we find communion.
Roberto Bolano
Image
Every hundred feet the world changes
Roberto Bolano
Image
The sky, at sunset, looked like a carnivorous flower.
Roberto Bolano
Image
Then he went out without touching anything and put his arm around Ingeborg, and like that, with their arms around each other, they returned to the village while the whole past of the universe fell on their heads.
Roberto Bolano
Image
You run risks. That's the plain truth. You run risks and, even in the most unlikely places, you are subject to destiny's whims.
Roberto Bolano
Image
I decided to tell the truth even if it meant being pointed at.
Roberto Bolano
Image
The truth is we never stop being children, terrible children covered in sores and knotty veins and tumors and age spots, but ultimately children, in other words we never stop clinging to life because we are life.
Roberto Bolano
Image
No one pays attention to these killings, but the secret of the world is hidden in them.
Roberto Bolano
Image
We never stop reading, although every book comes to an end, just as we never stop living, although death is certain.
Roberto Bolano
Image
They could read him, they could study him, they could pick him apart, but they couldn't laugh or be sad with him.
Roberto Bolano
Image
Reading is more important than writing.
Roberto Bolano
Image
When you die of sorrow it's as if you've broken all the bones in your body, bruised yourself all over, cracked your skull. That's sorrow.
Roberto Bolano
Image
That's a pretty story,' said Afanasievna as she let go of Ansky's genitals. 'A pity I'm too old and have seen to much to believe it.' It has nothing to do with belief,' said Ansky, 'it has to do with understanding, and then changing.
Roberto Bolano
Image
You have to know how to look even if you don't know what you're looking for.
Roberto Bolano
Image
There's no place on earth with more dumb girls per square foot than a college in California.
Roberto Bolano
Image
So everything lets us down, including curiosity and honesty and what we love best. Yes, said the voice, but cheer up, it's fun in the end.
Roberto Bolano