The Hatred of Music Quotes

“The sea is not a surface. It is, from top to bottom, an abyss. “If you want to cross the sea, sink.”
― Pascal Quignard, The Hatred of Music

“Nothing human has ever mattered to this world. Nothing human has ever excited the interest of rivers or flowers. Everything fades away in the specks of this blurred haze that the fire of the sun has added to the heat of the light.”
― Pascal Quignard, The Hatred of Music

“Primo Levi laid bare the oldest function assigned to music. Music, he writes, was felt to be a “malediction.” It was a “hypnosis of continuous rhythm that annihilates thought and numbs pain.”
― Pascal Quignard, The Hatred of Music

“Dance is an image. As painting is a song. Simulacra simulate. A rite repeats a metaphora (a voyage). Moving trucks in modern-day Greece still have the word METAPHORA on their sides. A myth is the danced image of the rite itself, which is expected to attract the world.”
― Pascal Quignard, The Hatred of Music

“This is the hour of silence. In no way does silence mean lack of sound: it means a state in which the ear is the most alert.”
― Pascal Quignard, The Hatred of Music

“How can one look down upon death? Intending to disapprove of it? I disapprove of the Acheron. I disapprove of shadows. Declaring that it is too unjust? That it is illegal? How can one reprimand domination or sickness? Sexuation? How can one say no to terror? How can one disagree with what is? The recent religion of happiness turns my stomach. People who decide to evade dread, I do my utmost to keep my lips from quivering and stretching, I pinch myself until I bleed in order not to laugh.”
― Pascal Quignard, The Hatred of Music