Melina Mendoza > Melina's Quotes

“Some books will remain famous but will be considered anonymous works, as for us the epic of Gilgamesh; others author's names will still be known, but none of their works will survive, as was the case with Socrates; or perhaps, all the surviving books will be attributed to a single, mysterious author, like Homer.”
― Italo Calvino, If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler

“A good person. Not a bad resolution to make, in dark times.”
― J.M. Coetzee, Disgrace

“If a man stands before a mirror and sees in it his reflections what he sees is not a true reproduction of himself but a picture of himself when he was a younger man.”
― Flann O'Brien, The Third Policeman

“How is it possible to defeat not the authors but the functions of the author, the idea that behind each book there is someone who guarantees a truth in that world of ghosts and inventions by the mere fact of having invested in it his own truth, of having identified himself with that construction of words?”
― Italo Calvino, If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler

“The question is not, are we sorry? The question is, what lesson have we learned? The question is what are we going to do now that we are sorry?”
― J.M. Coetzee, Disgrace

“God knows wherebthey are now, the people I receive instructions, or rather-let's come right out and say it-take orders. It is obvious I'm a subordinate.”
― Italo Calvino

“You are quick to catch the author's intentions and nothing escapes you”
― Italo Calvino, If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler

“I am the I of the present”
― Italo Calvino, If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler

“The author was an invisible point from which the books came”
― Italo Calvino, If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler

“Since I have become a slave of writing, the pleasure of reading has ended for me.”
― Italo Calvino, If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler

“Technically he is old enough to be her father; but then, technically one can be a father at twelve.”
― J.M. Coetzee, Disgrace

“At what age , he wonders, did Origen castrate himself? Not the most graceful solution, but then ageing is not a graceful bussines.”
― J.M. Coetzee, Disgrace

“Women are sensitive to it, to the weight of the desiring gaze.”
― J.M. Coetzee

“In a minute, in an hour, it will be too late; whatever is happening to her will be set in stone, will belong to the past. But now is not too late. Now he must do something”
― J.M. Coetzee, Disgrace

“A risk to own anything : a car, a pair of shoes, a packet of cigarettes. Not enough to go around. Not enough shoes, cars, cigarettes. Too many people too few things. What there is must go into circulation, so that everyone can have a chance to be happy for a day.”
― J.M. Coetzee, Disgrace

“The reason is that as far as I am concerned, what happened to me is a purely private matter. In another time, in another place it might be held to be a public matter. But in this place, in this time, it is not. It is my bussines, mine alone.
'This place being what?'
'This place being South Africa”
― J.M. Coetzee, Disgrace

“Moer and more he is convinced that English is an unfit medium for the truth in South Africa.”
― J.M. Coetzee, Disgrace

“Who had uttered these words? They had not frightened me. They were clearly audible to me yet I knew the did not ring out across the air like the chilling cough of the old man in the chair,
They came from deep inside me, from my soul. Never before had I believed or suspected that I had a soul but just then I knew I had.”
― Flann O'Brien, The Third Policeman

“Is it life?' he answered.'I would rather be without it' he said, ' for there is a queer small utility in it. You cannot eat it or drink it or smoke it in your pipe, [...] It is a great mistake and a thing better done without, like red-bars and foreign bacon.”
― Flann O'Brien, The Third Policeman

“There are five [rules of wisdom] in all.
Always ask any questions that are to be asked and never answer any. Turn everything you hear to your own advantage. Always carry a repair outfit. Take left turns as much as possible. Never apply your front brake first.”
― Flann O'Brien, The Third Policeman

“You mean that because I have no name I cannot die and that you cannot be held answerable for death even if you kill me?”
― Flann O'Brien, The Third Policeman

“I am your soul and all your souls. When I am gone you are dead. Past humanity is not only implicit in each new man born but is contained in him,[...] All humanity from its beginning to its end is already present but the beam has not yet played beyond you! [...] You are not the top of your people's line any more than your mother was when she had you inside her. When I leave you I take with me all that has made you what you are-I take all your significance and importance and all accumulation of human instinct and appetite and wisdom and dignity. You will be left with nothing behind you and nothing to give the waiting ones. Woe to you when they fund you out! Good Bye!”
― Flann O'Brien, The Third Policeman

“The painter copies this bed from one point of view. He is thus at three removes from reality. He does not understand the bed, he does not measure it, he could not make it.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Fire and the Sun: Why Plato Banished the Artists

“Art both expresses and gratifies the lowest part of the soul, and feeds and enlivens base emotions which ought to be left to wither.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Fire and the Sun: Why Plato Banished the Artists

“The painter and the writer are not just copyists or even illusionists, but through some deeper vision of their subject-matter may become privileged truth tellers.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Fire and the Sun: Why Plato Banished the Artists