Reader

“Art is born and takes hold wherever there is a timeless and insatiable longing for the spiritual, for the ideal: that longing which draws people to art. Modern art has taken a wrong turn in abandoning the search for the meaning of existence in order to affirm the value of the individual for his own sake. What purports to be art begins to looks like an eccentric occupation for suspect characters who maintain that any personalized action is of intrinsic value simply as a display of self-will. But in an artistic creation the personality does not assert itself, it serves another, higher, and communal idea. The artist is always the servant, and is perpetually trying to pay for the gift that has been given to him as if by a miracle. Modern man, however, does not want to make any sacrifice, even though true affirmation of the self can only be expressed in sacrifice. We are gradually forgetting about this, and at the same time, inevitably, losing all sense of human calling.”
― Andrei Tarkovsky, Sculpting in Time

“I began to understand why some people could not bear the clamor of the sea. It has a mournful harping note sometimes, and the very persistence of it, that eternal roll and thunder and hiss, plays a jagged tune upon the nerves.”
― Daphne du Maurier, Rebecca

“All in all, it’s only the initial shock that counts. People get used to everything, everything that happens in the occupied zone:”
― Irène Némirovsky, Suite Française

“The sound of his boots … It would pass. The occupation would end. There would be peace, blessed peace. The war and the tragedy of 1940 would be no more than a memory, a page in history, the names of battles and treaties children would recite in school, but as for me, for as long as I live, I will never forget the low, regular sound of those boots pacing across the floorboards.”
― Irène Némirovsky, Suite Française