The Fires of Autumn Quotes

“She should have turned the other way, said nothing, waited...She's too young. She doesn't know that time heals all, wipes everything away. She doesn't know that her Bernard will change, that she will change. If they live to be old, they will change body and soul, two or even three times, perhaps more. She can't hold on to the man Bernard is today. She should leave him be, she should forget. Another Bernard will be there tomorrow.”
― Irène Némirovsky, The Fires of Autumn

“Sie arbeiteten, lasen, gingen herum, aßen, organisierten Spiele, Darbietungen, aber nur ein Teil ihrer selbst handelte; der andere schlief einen schmerzhaften Schlaf und würde erst an dem gesegneten Tag (doch wann würde er kommen? Wann?) erwachen, an dem man ihnen sagte: «Jetzt ist es soweit, es ist vorbei».”
― Irène Némirovsky, Les Feux de l'automne

“Ya no creo en las catástrofes, puesto que la última ha fracasado. Ya no creo en la desgracia, ni en la muerte. La humanidad entera se encuentra en el estado mental del niño que le ha perdido el miedo al coco.”
― Irène Némirovsky, The Fires of Autumn

“The sense of despair has to remove those barriers one by one, and only then does despair penetrate to the heart of man who gradually recognises the enemy, calls it by name, and is horrified.”
― Irène Némirovsky, The Fires of Autumn

“Everyone was saying that Europe, civilisation, the entire world was collapsing, that the century was destined to end in catastrophe, that everything would perish, drowned in blood. But she still hoped for a husband, a home, children, and she instinctively felt that the destruction of everything was a mirage, a lie, while she, she lived the truth.”
― Irène Némirovsky, The Fires of Autumn