Federico Castigliano > Federico's Quotes

“I tied the facts of my life so tightly to the spaces of the city, to the point that every corner of Paris reminds me of a conversation with a friend, an episode, a love.”
― Federico Castigliano, Flâneur: The Art of Wandering the Streets of Paris

“Segui il tuo corso et lascia dir les genti
(Follow your road and let the people say)”
― Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy: Inferno - Purgatorio - Paradiso

“There is no better place to keep a secret than in an unfinished novel.”
― Italo Calvino, The Castle of Crossed Destinies

“And yet the city is not dead: the machines, the engines, the turbines continue to hum and vibrate, every Wheel's cogs are caught in the cogs of other wheels, trains run on tracks and signals on wires; and no human is there any longer to send or receive, to charge or discharge. The machines, which have long known they could do without men, have finally driven them out; and after a long exile, the wild animals have come back to occupy the territory wrested from the forest: foxes and martens wave their soft tails over the control panels starred with manometers and levers and gauges and diagrams; badgers and dormice luxuriate on batteries and magnetos. Man was necessary; now he is useless. For the world to receive information from the world and enjoy it, now computers and butterflies suffice.”
― Italo Calvino, The Castle of Crossed Destinies

“I have long been seduced by the idea of losing myself, persuaded by the thought that there was something poetic in this dissipation. I thought that the destiny of every true flâneur was to immerse himself in the panorama surrounding him, to the point of becoming one with it and, ultimately, to vanish.”
― Federico Castigliano

“I have written much less than most people who write; I have drunk much more than most people who drink.”
― Guy Debord

“The status of celebrity offers the promise of being showered with ‘all good things’ that capitalism has to offer. The grotesque display of celebrity lives (and deaths) is the contemporary form of the cult of personality; those ‘famous for being famous’ hold out the spectacular promise of the complete erosion of a autonomously lived life in return for an apotheosis as an image. The ideological function of celebrity (and lottery systems) is clear - like a modern ‘wheel of fortune’ the message is ‘all is luck; some are rich, some are poor, that is the way the world is...it could be you!”
― Martin Jenkins

“Paris is narcotic for a man alone, a never-ending labyrinth where the anxiety of freedom is relieved.”
― Federico Castigliano, Flâneur: The Art of Wandering the Streets of Paris

“To be away from home and yet to feel oneself everywhere at home; to see the world, to be at the centre of the world, and yet to remain hidden from the world—impartial natures which the tongue can but clumsily define. The spectator is a prince who everywhere rejoices in his incognito.”
― Charles Baudelaire, The Painter of Modern Life and Other Essays

“The destiny of every walking man is to immerse himself in the panorama surrounding him, to the point of becoming one with it and, ultimately, to vanish".”
― Federico Castigliano, Flâneur: The Art of Wandering the Streets of Paris

“The greatest pleasure does not consist in experiencing new things, but in savoring the infinite variation of what we already know”
― Federico Castigliano, Flâneur: The Art of Wandering the Streets of Paris

“The flâneur wanders restless through the city like an untamed beast. He succumbs to the crowd like a wreck to the waves, letting himself be overcome by the liberating breath of anarchy. There is something voluptuous, almost orgiastic, in this dissolution.”
― Federico Castigliano, Flâneur: The Art of Wandering the Streets of Paris

“The flâneur is he who consecrates his own life to the instant, to ephemeral things.”
― Federico Castigliano, Flâneur: The Art of Wandering the Streets of Paris

“The day in which you decline an invitation to see a film or a concert in order to walk along roads that you already know, the day in which you say no to a journey to some island paradise so as to contemplate the greyness of your own city in the rain… well, that’s the day you will know you are a true flâneur.”
― Federico Castigliano

“The prevailing interest in the world of phenomena and the flâneur’s freedom of movement contrasted on the one hand with the principles of the metaphysical and religious tradition on which pre-industrial civilization was based and, on the other, with the dogma of productivity which held sway over the nascent bourgeois society. Hence the paradoxical nature of the flâneur, the shattered mirror of modernity. He acts out his own dissonant idleness right in the beating heart of the city and he steeps himself in the tumult of the crowd while seeking to maintain a critical detachment.”
― Federico Castigliano, Flâneur: The Art of Wandering the Streets of Paris

“Free and alone in the maze of the city, the flâneur craves a revelation that might change his life and destiny.”
― Federico Castigliano, Flâneur: The Art of Wandering the Streets of Paris

“Paris is like oxygen to a dying man, a dose of opium that comforts those addicted to urban beauty. There is no great despair that cannot be alleviated by the spectacle of Paris. There is no misadventure that cannot be forgotten, at least momentarily, thanks to its magnificence.”
― Federico Castigliano, Flâneur: The Art of Wandering the Streets of Paris

“On further reflection regarding the pros and cons of the various possibilities the city offers, I decide in the end to head down Rue du Bac and to go to the Bon Marchè to try a few of their famous macarons. Like colored communion wafers, macarons are an almost intangible and spiritual nutrition: they provide a good quantity of sugar and don’t represent a challenge for one’s digestive system.”
― Federico Castigliano, Flâneur: The Art of Wandering the Streets of Paris

“The day in which you decline an invitation to see a film or a concert in order to walk along roads that you already know, the day in which you say no to a journey to some island paradise so as to contemplate the greyness of your own city in the rain... well, that’s the day you will know you are a true flâneur.”
― Federico Castigliano, Flâneur: The Art of Wandering the Streets of Paris

“The gods had given me almost everything. But I let myself be lured into long spells of senseless and sensual ease. I amused myself with being a flâneur, a dandy, a man of fashion. I surrounded myself with the smaller natures and the meaner minds. I became the spendthrift of my own genius, and to waste an eternal youth gave me a curious joy. Tired of being on the heights, I deliberately went to the depths in the search for new sensation. What the paradox was to me in the sphere of thought, perversity became to me in the sphere of passion. Desire, at the end, was a malady, or a madness, or both. I grew careless of the lives of others. I took pleasure where it pleased me, and passed on. I forgot that every little action of the common day makes or unmakes character, and that therefore what one has done in the secret chamber one has some day to cry aloud on the housetop. I ceased to be lord over myself. I was no longer the captain of my soul, and did not know it. I allowed pleasure to dominate me. I ended in horrible disgrace. There is only one thing for me now, absolute humility.”
― Oscar Wilde, De Profundis

“Paris presents itself to the flâneur as the realm of the possible, the ideal place in which all experiences are theoretically achievable. In exploring a city, some prefer to follow a maniacal scheme, visiting roads or monuments in alphabetical order, moving around with a compass or with a pedometer. Others love to follow in a prosaic manner the instructions of tourist guides, or the suggestions they have heard from friends or acquaintances. Nevertheless, although it may appear paradoxical, in order to acquire a profound view of things, you must first of all move randomly. This is the founding dogma and, I would dare say, the “gnoseological principle” of flânerie. The flâneur moves through the city with neither a map nor a plan. He has to feel himself to be free and alone, ready and willing for the imponderable. The attitude of the true flâneur consists of not establishing a hierarchy between what most people consider important and what instead, normally, is not of any interest to anyone”
― Federico Castigliano, Flâneur: The Art of Wandering the Streets of Paris

“Parfois, quand la symphonie de la ville frappe à ma porte au petit matin, je descends dans la rue et me mets en chemin, enveloppé dans mon manteau noir, le long des avenues bondées de la rive droite. Ce sont ces sombres jours d’hiver où le spleen de Paris tourmente les âmes et incite les esprits libres à une longue dérive sans but ni destination.”
― Federico Castigliano

“Paris est la drogue du solitaire, un labyrinthe inépuisable où l’angoisse du possible s’apaise.”
― Federico Castigliano, Flâneur: L'art de vagabonder dans Paris

“Mais parfois il y a quelque chose de fébrile, de morbide, dans l’allure du flâneur. Il erre dans la ville, semble être à la recherche d’une chimère. Sa destination est confuse ou impossible à atteindre. Son pas se fait nerveux, exaspéré : on dirait un homme en fuite. Le flâneur fuit la banalité de la vie ordinaire. Il fuit les souvenirs et les spectres de son intériorité.”
― Federico Castigliano, Flâneur: L'art de vagabonder dans Paris

“Il flâneur è colui che consacra la propria vita all’attimo, alle cose effimere.”
― Federico Castigliano, Flâneur: The Art of Wandering the Streets of Paris

“Ma a volte c’è un qualcosa di febbrile, di morboso, nell’andatura del flâneur. Vaga per la città, sembra alla ricerca di una chimera. La sua meta è confusa o irraggiungibile. La sua andatura si fa nervosa, esasperata: pare un uomo in fuga. Il flâneur fugge la banalità della vita comune. Fugge i ricordi e gli spettri della sua interiorità. Lo sfavillare dell’apparenza fenomenica riempie la cavità vuota del suo io. Il flâneur è un uomo gettato nella strada da un’inquietudine, sospinto da un’ansia di ricerca che lo perseguita e lo distingue da coloro che se ne stanno placidamente seduti al tavolino di un caffè. Come una bestia indomita, il flâneur vaga per la città irrequieto. Si abbandona alla folla come una carcassa all’onda, si lascia invadere dal soffio liberatorio dell’anarchia. E c’è qualcosa di voluttuoso, quasi di orgiastico, in questa dissoluzione.”
― Federico Castigliano, Flâneur: The Art of Wandering the Streets of Paris