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Books are not made to be believed, but to be subjected to inquiry.

Umberto Eco

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Umberto Eco
Age: 84 †
Born: 1932
Born: January 5
Died: 2016
Died: February 19
Essayist
Historian
Literary Critic
Literary Scholar
Medievalist
Novelist
Pedagogue
Philosopher
Screenwriter
Semiotician
Translator
Lissändria
Umberto Ecco
Umberto Eccounstino
Humberto Eco
Dedalus
Umberto Eko
Oumperto Eko
Eco Umberto
U. Eco
Subjected
Inquiry
Believed
Books
Book
Made

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Whoever reflects on four things I would be better if he were never born: that which is above, that which is below, that which is before, that which is after.
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Only an unhinged movie survives as a disconnected series of images, of peaks, of visual icebergs. It should display not one central idea but many. It should not reveal a coherent philosophy of composition. It must live on, and because of, its glorious ricketiness.
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For many years I have devoted articles and essays to newspapers, from the inside. So criticism of the newspapers was a topic that I practiced for a long time.
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The poets did not win the philosophers surrendered.
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Thus we have on stage two men, each of whom knows nothing of what he believes the other knows, and to deceive each other reciprocally both speak in allusions, each of the two hoping (in vain) that the other holds the key to his puzzle.
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I wrote a novel because I had a yen to do it. I believe this is sufficient reason to set out to tell a story.
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I don't know, maybe we're always looking for the right place, maybe it's within reach, but we don't recognize it. Maybe to recognize it, we have to believe in it.
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For, I must tell you, in this world where today all lose their minds over many & wondrous Machines - some of which, alas, you can see also in this Siege - I construct Aristotelian Machines, that allow anyone to see with Words.
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Socrates ... did not write. It seems academically obvious that he perished because he did not publish!
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Then we are living in a place abandoned by God, I said, disheartened. Have you found any places where God would have felt at home? William asked me, looking down from his great height.
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When we traded the results of our fantasies, it seemed to us-and rightly-that we had proceeded by unwarranted associations, by shortcuts so extraordinary that, if anyone had accused us of really believing them, we would have been ashamed.
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Fear prophets and those prepared to die for the truth, for as a rule they make many others die with them, often before them, at times instead of them.
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The Enlightenment, the Age of Reason, is seen as the beginning of modern depravity.
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I've always said that I learned the English I know through two sources -- Marvel Comics and Finnegans Wake.
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One of the problems I have always discussed is the refusal to distinguish between comment and fact. The newspaper wraps every fact into a comment. It is impossible to give mere fact without establishing point of view.
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Beauty has never been absolute and immutable but has taken on different aspects depending on the historical period and the country
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In other words, although I don't like them, we do need noble-spirited souls.
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Semiotics is a general theory of all existing languages... all forms of communication - visual, tactile, and so on... There is general semiotics, which is a philosophical approach to this field, and then there are many specific semiotics.
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My collection of rare books concerns only books that don't tell the truth.
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A library's ideal function is to be a little bit like a bouquiniste's stall, a place for trouvailles.
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