Thérèse Raquin Quotes

“When there is no hope in the future, the present appears atrociously bitter.”
― Émile Zola, Therese Raquin

“They dared not peer down into their own natures, down into the feverish confusion that filled their minds with a kind of dense, acrid mist.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“In the sudden change that had come over her heart she no longer recognized herself”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“Nothing could be more heart rending than this mute and motionless dispair”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“He knew that, from now on, every day would be alike, that they would all bring the same sufferings. And he saw the weeks, the months, the years that awaited him, gloomy and implacable, coming one after the other, falling on him and suffocating him bit by bit. When the future is without hope, the present takes on a vile, bitter taste.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“Sometimes she was seized with hallucinations and thought she was buried in some vault together with a lot of puppet-like corpses which nodded their heads and moved their legs and arms when you pulled the strings.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“they seemed to be greater strangers than before”
― Émile Zola, Therese Raquin

“They have so smothered me in their middle-class refinement that I don't know how there can be any blood left in my veins. I lowered my eyes, put on a dismal, silly expression, just like them; I was just as dead-and-alive as they were.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“His remorse was purely physical. Only his body, strained nerves, and cowering flesh were afraid of the drowned man. Conscience played no part in his terrors, and he had not the slightest regret about killing Camille; in his moments of calm, when the spectre was not present, he would have committed the murder over again had he thought his interests required it.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“Living in musty shadows and dismal, oppressive silence, Thérèse could see her whole life stretching out before her totally void, bringing night after night the same cold bed and morning after morning the same empty day.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“Like certain devotees, who think they can fool God and wrest a pardon by paying lip-service to prayer and adopting the humble attitude of the penitent, Therese humiliated herself, beat her chest, found words of repentance, without having anything in the bottom of her heart except fear and cowardice.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“The couple fell one atop of the other, struck down, finding consolation, at last, in death.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“After a time, she believed in the reality of this comedy”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“When they got back into the carriage they felt greater strangers than before.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“All his [Laurent's] great powerful body wanted was to do nothing, to wallow in never-ending idleness and self-indulgence. He would have liked to eat well, sleep well, satisfy his passions liberally, without stirring from one spot or risking the misfortune of a bit of fatigue.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“La disperazione non si era mai abbattuta con tanto furore su un essere umano. La sinistra verità bruciò con l’impeto di un lampo negli occhi della paralitica e s’insediò in lei con la ferocia senza scampo della folgore. Se avesse potuto alzarsi in piedi, vomitare l’orrore che l’afferrava alla gola, maledire gli assassini del figlio, avrebbe sofferto di meno. Invece, dopo aver ascoltato, dopo aver compreso, era condannata a rimanere immobile, chiusa nel silenzio, a custodire quel dolore scoppiante: non aveva scampo.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“She made one instinctive effort to resist and then yielded, slipping down on to the floor. Not a single word was exchanged. The act was silent and brutal”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“Lorsque l'avenir est sans espoir, le présent prend une amertume ignoble”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“On her [Thérèse's] part she seemed to revel in daring and shamelessness. Not a single moment of hesitation or fear possessed her. She threw herself into adultery with a kind of furious honesty, flouting danger, and as it were, taking pride in doing so.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“The critics greeted this book with a churlish and horrified outcry. Certain virtuous people, in newspapers no less virtuous, made a grimace of disgust as they picked it up with the tongs to throw it into the fire. Even the minor literary reviews, the ones that retail nightly the tittle-tattle from alcoves and private rooms, held their noses and talked of filth and stench. I am not complaining about this reception; on the contrary I am delighted to observe that my colleagues have such maidenly susceptibilities.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“La nature et les circonstances semblaient avoir fait cette femme pour cet homme, et les avoir poussés l'un vers l'autre.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“In cima alla via Guénégaud, venendo dalla strada lungo la Senna, si trova il passaggio del Ponte Nuovo, una specie di corridoio stretto e oscuro che va dalla via Mazarino alla via della Senna. Quel passaggio ha, al massimo, trenta passi di lunghezza e due di larghezza; è selciato di pietre giallastre, consunte, sconnesse, che trasudano sempre un'acre umidità; la vetrata che lo ricopre, tagliata ad angolo retto, è nera di sporcizia.
Nei bei giorni d'estate, quando un ardente sole incendia le vie, un chiarore biancastro cade dai vetri sporchi e si trascina miseramente nel passaggio. Nei brutti giorni d'inverno, nelle mattinate di nebbia, i vetri gettano soltanto oscurità sulle pietre viscide, oscurità sporca e ignobile.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“À eux deux, la femme, nerveuse et hypocrite, l'homme, sanguin et vivant en brute, ils faisaient un couple puissamment lié. Ils se complétaient, se protégeaient mutuellement. Le soir, à table, dans les clartés pâles de la lampe, on sentait la force de leur union, à voir le visage épais et souriant de Laurent, en face du masque muet et impénétrable de Thérèse.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“Quando non c’è più speranza nel futuro, il presente si colora di una spaventosa amarezza.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“O şimdiye kadar bedeniyle sevmişti. Şimdi kafasıyla sevmeye başladı.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“Ah! si ton mari mourait...
Si mon mari mourait..., répéta lentement Thérèse.
Nous nous marierions ensemble, nous ne craindrions plus rien, nous jouirions largement de nos amours... Quelle bonne et douce vie!”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“such a strange look of repugnance and horror”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“For Madame Raquin, there was such a fathomless depth in this thought, that she could neither reason it out, nor grasp it clearly. She experienced but one sensation, that of a horrible disaster; it seemed to her that she was falling into a dark, cold hole. And she said to herself: “I shall be smashed to pieces at the bottom.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“Il a besoin de cette femme pour vivre comme on a besoin de boire et de manger.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin

“Laurent avait élargi une de ses grosses mains dont il regardait attentivement la paume. Ses doigts eurent de légers frémissements, des lueurs rouges montèrent à ses joues ... Laurent leva la tête et vit Thérèse devant lui, muette, immobile. La jeune femme le regardait avec une fixité ardente. Ses yeux, d'un noir mat, semblaient deux trous sans fond, et, par ses lèvres entrouvertes, on apercevait des clartés roses dans sa bouche. Elle était comme écrasée, ramassée sur elle-même; elle écoutait.”
― Émile Zola, Thérèse Raquin