Ce que le jour doit à la nuit Quotes

“Life is a train that stops at no stations; you either jump abroad or stand on the platform and watch as it passes.”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“Celui qui passe à coté de la plus belle histoire de sa vie n'aura que l'âge de ses regrets et tous les soupirs du monde ne sauraient bercer son âme.”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“Nous, les Arabes, ne sommes pas paresseux. Nous prenons seulement le temps de vivre. Ce qui n'est pas le cas des Occidentaux. Pour eux, le temps, c'est de l'argent.
Pour nous, le temps ça n'a pas de prix. Un verre de thé suffit à notre bonheur, alors qu'aucun bonheur ne leur suffit. Toute la différence est là.”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“For a man to think he can fulfil his destiny without a woman is a misunderstanding, a miscalculation; it is reckless and folly. Certainly a woman is not everthing, but everything depends on her.”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“Though there are things beyond our understanding, for the most part we are the architects of our own unhappiness.”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“If you want your life to be a small part of eternity, to be lucid even in the heart of madness, love... Love with all your strength, love as though it is all you know how to do, love enough to make the gods themselves jealous... for it is in love that all ugliness reveals its beauty.”
― Yasmina Khadra, What the Day Owes the Night

“...tout compte fait, je crois que mon tort était de ne pas avoir eu le courage de mes convictions. Je pouvais me trouver toutes les excuses du monde, aucune d'elles ne me donnerait raison. En réalité maintenant que j'avais perdu la face , je me cherchais un masque. Pareil à un défiguré, je me cachais derrière mes pansements qui me servaient aussi de moucharabiehs. Je regardais en cachette la vérité des autres, en abusais pour distancer la mienne”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“Quand on ne trouve pas la solution à son malheur, on lui cherche un coupable.”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“La vie est un apprentissage permanent ; plus on croit savoir, moins on sait, tant les choses changent et avec elles les mentalités.”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“What to keep of all these reels of film, what to throw away? If we could only take 1 memory on our journey, what would we choose? At the expense of what or whom? And most importantly, how to choose among all these shadows, all these spectres, all these titans? Who are we, when all is said and done? Are we the people we once were or the people we wish we had been? Are we the pain we caused others or the pain we suffered at the hands of others? The encounters we missed or those fortuitous meetings that changed the course of our destiny? Our time behind the scenes that saved us form our vanity or the moment in the limelight that warmed us? We are all of these things, we are the whole life that we have lived, its highs and lows, its fortunes and its hardships, we are the sum of the ghosts that haunt us... we are a host of characters in one, so convincing in every role we played that it is impossible for us to tell who we really were, who we have become, who we will be.”
― Yasmina Khadra, What the Day Owes the Night

“Si tu veux pleurer, pleure; si tu veux espérer, prie, mais, de grâce, ne cherche pas de coupable là où tu ne trouves pas de sens à ta douleur.”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“This land does not belong to you. It belongs to that ancient shepherd whose ghost is standing next to you, though you refuse to see it. Since you do not know how to share, take your vineyards and your bridges, your paved roads and your railway tracks, your cities and your gardens and give back what remains to its rightful owners".”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“...we are the whole life that we have lived, its highs and lows, its fortunes and its hardships; we are the sum of the ghosts that haunt us...”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“Ce n'était pas une vie; on existait, et c'est tout.”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“Je me demande encore si, tout compte fait, le monde n'étaient qu’apparences.”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“Only after something is done do we truly realise it cannot be undone. Never had a night seemed to me so ill-omened; never had a celebration seemed to me so unjust, so cruel. The music drifting on the breeze sounded like an incantation that conjured me like a demon. I felt excluded from the joy of these people as they laughed and danced. I thought about the terrible waste my life had become … How? How could I have come so close to happiness and not had the courage to seize it with both hands? What terrible sin had I committed that I was forced to watch love seep though my fingers like blood from a wound? What is love when all it can do is survey the damage? What are its myths and legends, its victories and its miracles if a lover is not prepared to rise above, to brave the thunderbolt, to renounce eternal happiness for one kiss, one embrace, one moment with his beloved? Regret coursed through my veins like a poisonous sap, swelled my heart with loathsome fury. I hated myself, this useless burden abandoned by the roadside.”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“Si la ville était une illusion, la campagne serait une émotion sans cesse grandissante ; chaque jour qui s'y lève rappelle l'aube de l'humanité, chaque soir s'y amène comme une paix définitive.”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“Sunset, springtime, the blue of the sea, the stars in the sky, all the things that entrance us exert their magic only in the orbit if woman.”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“Quand la femme n’est pas l’ambition suprême de l’homme, quand elle n’est pas la fin de toute initiative en ce monde, la vie ne mériterait ni ses joies ni ses peines”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“On ne retombe pas en enfance, on n'en sort jamais. Vieux, moi? Qu'est-ce qu'un vieillard sinon un enfant qui a pris de l'âge ou du vendre ?...”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“Chaque homme est son propre dieu. C'est en choisissant un autre qu'il se renie et devient aveugle et injuste.”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“Posterity has never made the grave's embrace less cruel. It simply assuages our fear of death, because there is no better cure for out inevitable morality then the illusion of a beautiful eternity. But there is one illusion I still hold dear: that is the thought of an enlightened nation. That is the only future I still dream of.”
― Yasmina Khadra, What the Day Owes the Night

“Run after her… One day, man will surely be able to catch a comet, but all the glories of this world will not console the man who allows the real opportunity in his life to slip away.”
― Yasmina Khadra, When the days owes the night

“Somewhere it is written that I was born to leave my home, to constantly leave, each time leaving a part of me behind.”
― Yasmina Khadra, When the days owes the night

“...the one, true unique beauty is woman. The rest, all the rest, exists simply to adorn her.”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“Les choses se seraient arrêtées là s'il n'y avait pas eu ce coup de vent. Si on m'avait dit qu'un simple coup de vent pouvait changer le cours d'une vie, j'aurais peut-être pris les devant. Mais à dix-sept ans, on se sent en mesure de retomber sur ses pattes quoi qu'il arrive.”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“Ressaisis-toi, bonhomme. Il n'y a q'un seul dieu sur terre, et c'est toi. Si le monde ne te convient pas, réinventes-en un autre, et ne laisse aucun chagrin te faire descendre de ton nuage. La vie sourit toujours à celui qui sait lui rendre la monnaie de sa pièce.”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“Quant à ce que nous appelons fatalité, ce n'est que notre entêtement à ne pas assumer les conséquences de nos petites et grandes faiblesses.”
― Yasmina Khadra, Ce que le jour doit à la nuit

“Was I happy after that? I think so. I experienced moments of pleasure, moments of unforgettable joy; I loved again and dreamed again like a wide-eyed boy. And yet I always felt there was something missing, something that left me somehow crippled, in short that I only every hovered on the fringes of happiness.”
― Yasmina Khadra, When the days owes the night

“I stayed at the port until the dawn broke, leaning over the railing, unable to reconcile myself to the idea that something that had never really begun was truly over.”
― Yasmina Khadra, When the days owes the night