Quote

Man exists only insofar as he is separated from his surroundings. The cranium is a space-traveler's helmet. Stay inside or you perish.

Vladimir Nabokov

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Vladimir Nabokov
Age: 77 †
Born: 1899
Born: January 1
Died: 1977
Died: January 1
Autobiographer
Chess Composer
Chess Player
Journalist
Lepidopterist
Literary Critic
Novelist
Playwright
Poet
Science Fiction Writer
St. Petersburg
Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov
Vladimir Sirin
Vl. Sirin
Wladimir Nabokoff-Sirin
V. Sirin
Men
Separated
Traveler
Surroundings
Exists
Cranium
Mankind
Insofar
Stay
Envelopes
Inside
Helmet
Space
Perish

More quotes by Vladimir Nabokov

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I was the shadow of the waxwing slain/By the false azure in the windowpane.
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When I receive a new novel from a hopeful publisher - hoping that I like the book as much as he does - I check first of all how much dialog there is, and if it looks too abundant or too sustained, I shut the book with a bang.
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Although I do not care for the slogan art for art's sake, there can be no question that what makes a work of fiction safe from larvae and rust is not its social importance but its art, only its art.
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Old birds like Orlovius are wonderfully easy to lead by the beak, because a combination of decency and sentimentality is exactly equal to being a fool.
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It's a pity one can't imagine what one can't compare to anything. Genius is an African who dreams up snow.
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My Carmen, I said (I used to call her that sometimes) we shall leave this raw sore town as soon as you get out of bed. ... Because, really, I continued, there is no point in staying here. There is no point in staying anywhere, said Lolita.
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My loathings are simple: stupidity, oppression, crime, cruelty, soft music.
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My heart was a hysterical unreliable organ.
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Knowing you have something good to read before bed is among the most pleasurable of sensations.
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Dostoevky's lack of taste, his monotonous dealings with persons suffering with pre-Freudian complexes, the way he has of wallowing in the tragic misadventures of human dignity - all this is difficult to admire.
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I shall be dumped where the weed decays, And the rest is rust and stardust
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To play safe, I prefer to accept only one type of power: the power of art over trash, the triumph of magic over the brute.
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I think it is all a matter of love.
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The social or economic structure of the ideal state is of little concern to me. My desires are modest. Portraits of the head of the government should not exceed a postage stamp in size. No torture and no executions. No music, except coming through earphones, or played in theaters. Freedom of speech, freedom of thought, freedom of art.
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Beauty plus pity -- that is the closest we can get to a definition of art.
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We hasten to alienate the very fates we intended to woo.
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As far as I can recall, the initial shiver of inspiration [for Lolita] was somehow prompted by a newspaper story about an ape in the Jardin des Plantes, who, after months of coaxing by a scientist, produced the first drawing ever charcoaled by an animal: this sketch showed the bars of the poor creature's cage.
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Suddenly for no earthly reason I felt immensely sorry for him and longed to say something real, something with wings and a heart, but the birds I wanted settled on my shoulders and head only later when I was alone and not in need of words.
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do what only a true artist can do ... pounce upon the forgotten butterfly of revelation
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