The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories Quotes

“There are two kinds of people, those who like to sleep next to the wall, and those who like to sleep next to the people who push them off the bed.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories

“You'll never know what's happening inside the heads of other people.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories

“I think she cried at my funeral. It's not that I'm conceited or anything, but I'm pretty sure. Sometimes I can actually picture her talking about me to some guy she feels close to. Talking about me dying. About how they lowered me into the grave, kind of shrivelled up and pitiful, like an old chocolate bar. About how we never really got a chance. And afterwards the guy fucks her, a fuck that's all about making her feel better.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted To Be God

“I have always thought that Heaven is a place for people who had had a good life, but that is not true. God is merciful and way too good to make it so. The Heaven is just a place for people who could not be really happy while living on Earth. I was once told that people who commit suicide are taken back on Earth to repeat life from the very beginning because if they did not like it once, it did not mean they would not like it the next time. But those who did not fit in on Earth at all, ended up here. Everyone comes to Heaven in their own way.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories

“Доплака му се, но в очите му нямаше сълзи. Какъв е смисълът, да си идеално вакуумиран, ако си целият мокър отвътре?”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories

“Cennetin hayatlarını iyilik yapmaya adamışların yeri olduğunu sanırdım, ama öyle değilmiş. Tanrı böyle bir karar vermeyecek kadar merhametli ve müşfik. Cennet dünyada gerçekten mutlu olamayanların yeri”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories

“Udi was just fooling around. He didn't really mean to hurt the angel, just to make him fly a little, for laughs. But the angel dropped the whole five floors, like a sack of potatoes. Stunned, Udi watched him lying there on the sidewalk below. His whole body was completely still, except the wings that were still fluttering a little, like when someone dies. That's when he finally understood that of all the things the angel had told him, nothing was true. That he wasn't even an angel, just a liar with wings.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories

“Ehud was tall and strong and was always quiet. Lots of people thought that Ehud was quiet because he was stupid. That wasn’t true. He may not have been the smartest kid on the block, but he was no moron either.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories

“Quanta.

On Yom Kippur Eve, the quanta went to ask Einstein for his forgiveness. “I'm not home,” Einstein yelled at them from behind his locked door. On their way back, people swore loudly at them through the windows, and someone even threw a can. The quanta pretended not to care, but deep in their hearts they were really hurt. Nobody understands the quanta, everybody hates them.
“You parasites,” people would shout at them as they walked down the road.
“Go serve in the army.”
“We wanted to, actually,” the quanta would try to explain, “but the army wouldn't take us because we're so tiny.” Not that anyone listened. Nobody listens to the quanta when they try to defend themselves, but when they say something that can be interpreted negatively, well, then everyone's all ears. The quanta can make the most innocent statement, like “Look, there's a cat!” and right away they're saying on the news how the quanta were stirring up trouble and they rush off to interview Schrödinger. All in all, the media hated the quanta worse than anybody, because once the quanta had spoken at an IBM press conference about how the very act of viewing had an effect on an event, and all the journalists thought the quanta were lobbying to keep them from covering the Intifada. The quanta could insist as much as they wanted that this wasn't at all what they meant and that they had no political agenda whatsoever, but nobody would believe them anyway. Everyone knew they were friends of the government's Chief Scientist.
Loads of people think the quanta are indifferent, that they have no feelings, but it simply isn't true. On Friday, after the program about the bombing of Hiroshima, they were interviewed in the studio in Jerusalem. They could barely talk. They just sat there facing the open mike and sniffling, and all the viewers at home, who didn't know the quanta very well, thought they were avoiding the question and didn't realize the quanta were crying What's sad is that even if the quanta were to write dozens of letters to the editors of all the scientific journals in the world and prove beyond a doubt that people had taken advantage of their naiveté, and that they'd never ever imagined it would end that way, it wouldn't do them any good, because nobody understands the quanta. The physicists least of all.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories

“Diğer serserilerden pek farkı yoktu Kobi'nin. İnsanın aslında çirkin mi yoksa aptal mı olduğuna karar veremediği tiplerden”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories

“İki tür insan vardır, duvar yanında uyuyanlar ve onları yataktan aşağı iten birinin yanında uyuyanlar.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories

“Cennet dünyada gerçekten mutlu olamayanların yeri.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories

“Oyuncaklarımı başka çocuklara verirdim. Asla yalan söylemezdim. Asla hırsızlık yapmazdım. Okul kavgalarında bile bana vuranlara karşılık vermezdim. Öteki yanağımı çevirirdim. Bu hastalık derecesinde iyi yüreklilik yıllar geçtikçe daha da kötü bir durum aldı, ama kimse bu konuda bir şey yapmayı aklından bile geçirmedi. Oysa hastalık derecesinde kötü yürekli olsaydım beni hemen psikiyatra götürür, önünü kesmeye çalışırlardı. Ama iyiysen? Bir sevinç çığlığı ya da iltifat karşılığında ihtiyaçlarını gidermek, içinde yaşadığımız toplumun fertlerinin işine gelen bir şey bu.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories

“Say,” Uzi pressed on, “is it true that when you people go out on a job they promise you seventy nymphomaniac virgins in Kingdom Come? All for you, solico?” “Sure, they promise,” Nasser said, “and look what it got me. Lukewarm vodka.” “So you’re just a sucker in the end, eh, ya Nasser,” Uzi gloated. “Sure thing.” Nasser nodded. “And you, what did they promise you?”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to Be God & Other Stories

“Everyone comes to heaven in their own way.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories

“the way, when you were still alive, d’you ever go looking for God?” “No,” Leehee said, and offered me some gum. “But I didn’t really have any reason to.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to Be God & Other Stories

“I’ve got another reason for you to come.” “Try me.” Gelfand shot the empty beer bottle in the garbage can and tried to sound interested. “You got anything better to do?”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to Be God & Other Stories

“Y’know,” he said and arched his back till his head reached the cereal shelf. “You know how they say suicides always happen in threes? Well, there’s something to it. People around you start dying, and you begin to ask yourself what the hell makes you different, and what’s keeping you alive anyway. It hit me like a Scud. I mean, I just didn’t have the answers.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to Be God & Other Stories

“People have short memories, he said, especially when bad things are concerned. People tend to forget, he said, but you won’t forget.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to Be God & Other Stories

“too, would never ever go visit their country. Because when he went with his parents to Germany fifty years ago everything looked nice, but it ended in hell.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to Be God & Other Stories

“That’s when he finally understood that of all the things the angel had told him, nothing was true. That he wasn’t even an angel, just a liar with wings.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to Be God & Other Stories

“when they started moving, he looked in the rear-view mirror and gave Eddie a sad wink, which somehow made the whole thing almost bearable.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to Be God & Other Stories

“Except that when it came to choosing between smiles and thanks on the one hand, and the good of society on the other, this driver knew what it had to be.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to Be God & Other Stories

“Fin dall'inizio la festa stentava a decollare e Dio il nano si mise a fare ogni genere di acrobazie perché gli ospiti non se ne andassero lasciandolo solo. Prese tre palline e le fece volteggiare in aria eseguendo una serie di numeri incredibili, uno dopo l'altro. Le persone che già erano vicine alla porta si tolsero i cappotti e si sedettero a guardare Dio il nano che dava il meglio di sé. Era passato da tre a quattro palline. Le lanciava in aria tracciando parabole perfette, afferrandole dietro la schiena o fra le gambe. Introdusse poi una quinta pallina e il pubblico trattenne il respiro. Ma Dio il nano non si fermò lì. Ne aggiunse un'altra, e poi altre cento, un miliardo. Riuscì a far volteggiare in aria tre miliardi di palline, tenendo in equilibrio sulla fronte un bicchiere di birra pieno fino all'orlo senza versarne neanche una goccia. E tutti gli ospiti fanfaroni, che non facevano che dire: "Beh, non ci vuole poi molto, questo lo so fare anch'io", oppure: "Una volta, a Las Vegas, ho visto un negro che si sarebbe pappato questi tappetto a colazione", dovettero ammettere che Dio il nano era davvero qualcosa di speciale. Alla fine tutti se ne andarono soddisfatti: gli ospiti, per via dello spettacolo fantastico, noi, perché in questo modo Dio il nano aveva creato l'universo, e lui, perché non doveva più rimanere solo.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories

“Two days after I killed myself I found a job here at some pizza joint.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories

“And when they started moving, he looked in the rear-view mirror and gave Eddie a sad wink, which somehow made the whole thing almost bearable.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories

“And suddenly the driver remembered how he'd once promised himself that if he became God in the end, he'd be merciful and kind, and would listen to all His creatures. So when he saw Eddie from way up in his driver's seat, he simply couldn't go through with it, and in spite of all his ideology and his simple arithmetic, he opened the door, and Eddie got on”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories

“So if you're really unhappy down there, and if all kinds of people are telling you that you're suffering from severe perceptual disorders, look for your own way of getting here, and when you find it, could you please bring some cards, 'cause we're getting pretty tired of the marbles. - from "Pipes”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories

“Има пилоти, които са стигнали при нас след лупинг в точно определено място от Бермудския триъгълник. Има домакини, които са се промушили през гърба на кухненския си долап, и математици, които са открили някоя деформация в топологичното пространство и им се е наложило да се проврат през нея. Така че - ако сте много нещастни там долу и ако всякакви хора ви обясняват, че страдате от остро перцептивно разстройство - потърсете личния си начин да се доберете дотук и когато го намерите, моля, донесете колода карти, че тези топчета ни дойдоха до гуша.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories

“Винаги съм вярвал, че Раят е място за хора, които цял живот са правили добро, само че не е така. Бог е прекалено милостив и щедър, за да вземе подобно решение. Раят просто е място за хора, които на земята са били истински неспособни на щастие. Тук ми казаха, че самоубийците получават възможност да изживеят живота си отново, защото не е речено, че ако не им е допаднал първия път, втория няма да им пасне. Но онези, които изобщо не си намират място на света, се озовават тук. И всеки от тях влиза в Рая по свой си начин.”
― Etgar Keret, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories