Bosnian Chronicle Quotes

“Hope is an act of desperate defiance against monstrous odds.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“Obojica su se slagali da je zivot u Bosni neobicno tezak i narod svih vera bedan i zaostao u svakom pogledu. Trazeci razloge i objasnjenja tome stanju, fratar je sve svodio na tursku vladavinu i tvrdio da nikakvog boljitka ne moze da bude dok se ove zemlje ne oslobode turske sile i dok tursku vlast ne zameni hriscanska. Defose nije hteo da se zadovolji tim tumacenjem, nego je trazio razloge i u hriscanima samima. Turska vladavina stvorila je, tvrdio je on, kod svojih hriscanskih podanika izvesne karakteristicne osobine, kao pritvorstvo, upornost, nepoverenje, lenost misli i strah od svake novine i svakog rada i pokreta. Te osobine, nastale u stolecima nejednake borbe i stalne odbrane, presle su u prirodu ovdasnjeg coveka i postale trajne crte njegovog karaktera. Nastale od nuzde i pod pritiskom, one su danas, i bice i ubuduce, velika prepreka napretku, rdjavo nasledje teske proslosti i krupne mane koje bi trebalo iskoreniti.”
― Ivo Andrić, Travnička hronika

“No one knows what it means to be born and to live on the brink, between two worlds....to love and hate both, to hesitate and waver all one's life. To have two homelands and yet have none. To be everywhere at home and to remain forever a stranger. In short, to be torn on a rack, but as both victim and torturer at once.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“Daville had no patience with petty superstitions, yet often caught himself entertaining them. One of these was to the effect that the summer months in Travnik were unlucky and usually brought along some unpleasant surprise or other.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“Only, is it a good thing to tie the reputation of the Empire to every imperial subject that comes along? There are many kinds of men, but there’s only one reputation of the Empire.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“The consular era had brought ferment and unrest to this provincial capital. The immediate and indirect effects of it were that many men rose and many stumbled and fell; many would remember it for the better, others for the worse.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“For although violence can spread terror and achieve some useful ends, it is not enough for a lasting rule. Terror soon blunts as an instrument of government. And everyone seems to know this except those who, impelled by circumstances or their own instincts perpetrate terror.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“Here in the East, on the other hand, sickness is looked upon as something not in the least exceptional. It makes its appearance and runs its course alongside health, and takes turns with it; one can hear it and feel it at every step.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“no one could wait like the Bosnian Moslems, for they were people of stolid faith and a granite-like pride, who could be as impetuous as a spring torrent and as patient as the earth.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“... gospodstvo je kao veliki vjetar; kreće se, kida i osipa.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“... lice pobjednika je kao ruža, ali lice pobjeđenoga je kao grobljanska zemlja, od koje svatko bježi i glavu okreće.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“Toliko je živa kod slabog čovjeka potreba da se vara i tako neograničena mogućnost da bude prevaren.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“... mladost se ne zadržava kod sjećanja, niti ostaje dugo pri istim mislima.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“... vrline jednog čovjeka mi primamo i cijenimo potpuno samo ako nam se ukazuju u obliku koji odgovara našim shvaćanjima i sklonostima.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“... travka treba i rosu i kosu.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“Nije najveća budala onaj koji ne umije da čita, nego onaj koji misli da je sve ono što pročita istina.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“... ja nalazim da je u pasjem zavijanju daleko manje zloće i okorelosti srca nego u pevanju ovih ljudi kad su pijani ili prosto poneseni svojim besom.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“... život ide daleko, dalje nego što mi možemo da ga pratimo, a ja se samo trudim da objasnim pojedine pojave, kad već ne mogu sve da razumijem.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“Nije to dobrota što nas nagoni da gradimo puteve, nego potreba i želja za širenjem korisnih veza i uticaja, a to mnogi smatraju opet našom ''zloćom''.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“-Možda revolucije rađaju čudovišta?
-Jeste, ali one se začinju u veličini i moralnoj čistoti, ali rađaju čudovišta.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“Ivo Andric, Bosnian chronicle (Quote about nostalgia, free translation from Bosnian lenguage)

More than three hundred years ago, brought us from our homeland, a unique Andalusia, a terrible, foolish, fratricidal whirlwind, which we can not understand even today, and who has not understood it to this day, scattered us all over the world and made us beggars to which gold does not help. Now, threw us on the East, and life on the East is not easy for us or blessed, and the as much man goes further and gets closer to the sun's birth, it is worse, because the land is younger and more raw and people are from the land. And our trouble is that we could not fully love this country, to which we owe becouse it has received us, accept us and provided us with shelter, nor could we hate the one who has unjustly took us away and expelled us as an unworthly sons. We do not know is it more difficult that we are here or that we are not there. Wherever we were outside of Spain, we would suffer because we would have two homelands, I know, but here life is too much pressed us and humiliated us. I know that we have been changed for a long time,we do not remember anymore how we were, but surely we remember that we were different. We left and road up long time ago and we traveled hard and we unluckily fell down and stopped at this place, and that is why we are no longer even a shadow of what we were. As a powder on a fruit that goes hand-to-hand, from man first fall of what is finest on him. That's why we are like this. But you know us, us and our life, if we can call this life. We live between "occupiers" and commonalty, miserable commonalty and terrible Turkish. Cutted away completely from our loved ones, we are careful to look after and keep everything Spanish, songs and meals and customs, but we feel that everything changes in us, spoils and forgets. We remember the language of our land, the lenguage we did take and carried three centuries ago, the lenguage which even do not speak there anymore, and we ridiculously speak with stumbling the language of the comonalty with which we suffer and the Turkish who rules over us. So it may not be a long day when we will be purely and humanly able to express ourselves only in prayer, and which actually does not need any words.
This so lonely and few, we marry between us and see that our blood is paling and fainting. We bend and shred in front of everyone, we mourn, suffer and contrive, as people said: on the ice we make campfire, we work, we gain, we save, not only for ourselves and for our children, but for all those who are stronger and more insolent, impudent than us and strike on our life , on the dignity, and on the wealth. So we preserved the faith for which we had to leave our beautiful country, but lost almost everything else. Luckily, and to our sorrow, we did not lose from our memory reminiscence of our dear country, as it was, before she drive away us like stepmother; just as it will never extinguish in us the desire for a better world, the world of order and humanity in which you goes stright, watches calmly and speaks openly. We can not free ourselves from that feeling, nor feeling that, in addition to everything, we belong to such a world, though, we are expelled and unhappy, otherwise we live. That's what we would like to know there. That our name does not die in that brighter and higher world that is constantly darkening and destroying, iconstantly moves and changes, but never collapses, and always for somebody exists, that that world knows that we are carrying him in our soul, that even here we serve him on our way, and we feel one with him, even though we are forever and hopelessly separated from him.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“Da, to su muke koje muče ljudi hrišćani sa Levanta i koje vi, pripadnici hrišćanskog Zapada,
ne možete nikad potpuno razumeti, isto kao što ih još manje mogu razumeti Turci. To je sudbina levantinskog čoveka, jer on je poussière humaine, ljudska prašina, što mučno promiče između Istoka i Zapada, ne pripadajući ni jednom a bijena od oba. To su ljudi koji znaju mnogo jezika, ali nijedan nije njihov, koji poznaju dve vere, ali ni u jednoj nisu tvrdi. To su žrtve fatalne ljudske podvojenosti na hrišćane i nehrišćane; večiti tumači i posrednici, a koji u sebi nose toliko nejasnosti i nedorečnosti; dobri znalci Istoka i Zapada i njihovih običaja i verovanja, ali podjednako prezreni i sumnjivi jednoj i drugoj strani. Na njih se mogu primeniti reči koje je pre šest vekova napisao veliki Dželaledin, Dželaledin Rumi: »Jer samog sebe ne mogu da poznam. Niti sam hrišćanin, ni Jevrejin, ni Pars, ni musliman. Nit’ sam sa Istoka ni sa Zapada, ni sa kopna ni sa mora.« malo, izdvojeno čovečanstvo koje grca pod dvostrukim Istočnim grehom, i koje treba još jednom da bude spaseno i otkupljeno a niko ne vidi kako ni od koga. To su ljudi sa granice, duhovne i fizičke, sa crne i krvave linije koja je usled nekog teškog i apsurdnog nesporazuma potegnuta između ljudi, božjih stvorenja, između kojih ne treba i ne sme da bude granice. To je ona ivica između mora i kopna, osuđena na večiti pokret i nemir. To je treći svet u koji se sleglo sve prokletstvo usled podeljenosti zemlje na dva sveta. To je...”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“Tada se moglo videti šta znači i kakva može da bude uzbuna turske čaršije u bosanskim varošima. Po nekoliko godina čaršija radi i ćuti, dosađuje se i životari, pazaruje i računa, upoređuje jednu godinu sa drugom, a pri svemu tome prati sve što se dešava, obaveštava se, »kupuje« vesti i glasove, prenosi ih šapatom od dućana do dućana, izbegavajući svaki zaključak i izraz sopstvenog mišljenja.
Tako se polako i neprimetno stvara i uobličava jedinstven duh čaršije. To je najpre samo jedno opšte i neodređeno raspoloženje, koje se ispoljava samo kratkim pokretima i psovkama za koje se zna na koga se odnose; zatim se postepeno pretvara u mišljenje koje se ne krije; i najposle postaje tvrdo i određeno uverenje o kome više nije potrebno ni govoriti i koje se još samo u delima ispoljava. Povezana i prožeta tim uverenjem, čaršija šapuće, sprema se, čeka, kao što pčeie čekaju čas rojenja. Nemogućno je prozreti logiku tih čaršijskih uzbuna, slepih, besnih, i redovito neplodnih, ali one imaju svoju logiku isto kao što imaju svoju nevidljivu tehniku, zasnovanu na tradiciji i nagonu. Vidi se samo kako buknu, besne, i jenjavaju.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“Ova briga oko čuvanja i održanja novca liči, kao sestra sestri, na onu brigu u detinjstvu za grošem koji je stalno nedostajao, a ove muke štednje i tvrdičenja na muke nemaštine i oskudice. Šta vredi sve to? Šta vredi kad se, evo, posle tolikih napora i uzaludnih bežanja i uspona, čovek vraća na polaznu tačku, kad u njegove misli, samo drugim putem, ulazi ista pakost i grubost, i u njegove reči i postupke surovost i prostota; kad je, da bi se očuvalo ono što je stekao, potrebna ista ružna muka koja prati sirotinju. Ukratko: šta vredi imati.mnogo i biti nešto, kad čovek ne može da se oslobodi straha od sirotinje, ni niskosti u mislima, ni grubosti u rečima, ni nesigumosti u postupcima, kad gorka i neumitna a nevidljiva beda prati čoveka u stopu, a taj lepši, bolji i mirniji život izmiče se kao varljivo priviđenje.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“He never even felt how countless petty circumstances were fusing together to create an imperceptible but powerful stream that would carry him back into that life which he had left as a child in the slums of San Giusto in Trieste, right back into the world of ugly squalor and besetting vice from which he had run with all his strength for thirty years and which, for a long time now, he had believed was behind him.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle

“Finché l’uomo vive nel suo ambiente e in condizioni normali, gli elementi del curriculum vitae rappresentano per lui periodi importanti e svolte significative della sua vita. Ma appena il caso o il lavoro o le malattie lo separano dagli altri e lo isolano, questi elementi di colpo cominciano a scolorirsi, si inaridiscono e si decompongono con incredibile rapidità, come una maschera di cartone o di lacca senza vita, usata una volta sola. Sotto questa maschera comincia a intravedersi un’altra vita, conosciuta solo a noi, ossia la “vera” storia del nostro spirito e del nostro corpo, che non è scritta da nessuna parte, di cui nessuno suppone l’esistenza, una storia che ha molto poco a che fare con i nostri successi in società, ma che è, per noi, per la nostra felicità o infelicità, l’unica valida e la sola davvero importante.
Sperduto in quel luogo selvaggio, durante le lunghe notti, quando tutti i rumori erano cessati, Daville pensava alla sua vita passata come a una lunga serie di progetti audaci e di scoraggiamenti noti a lui solo, di lotte, di atti eroici, di fortune, di successi e di crolli, di disgrazie, di contraddizioni, di sacrifici inutili e di vani compromessi. Nelle tenebre e nel silenzio di quella città che ancora non aveva visto ma in cui lo attendevano, senza dubbio, preoccupazioni o difficoltà, sembrava che nulla al mondo si potesse risolvere né conciliare. In certi momenti gli pareva che per vivere fossero necessari sforzi enormi e per ogni sforzo una sproporzionata dose di coraggio. E, visto nel buio di quelle notti, ogni sforzo gli sembrava infinito. Per non fermarsi e rinunciare, l’uomo inganna se stesso, sostituendo gli obiettivi che non è riuscito a raggiungere con altri, che ugualmente non raggiungerà; ma le nuove imprese e i nuovi tentativi lo obbligheranno a cercare dentro di sé altre energie e maggiore coraggio. Così l’uomo si autoinganna e col passare del tempo diviene sempre più e senza speranza debitore verso se stesso e verso tutto quello che lo circonda.”
― Ivo Andrić, Travnička Kronika

“The verses which he published in various reviews from time to time, and the neatly copied poems which he sent to his friends, superiors, and important personages, were neither much better nor much worse than thousands of other verse products of the day.”
― Ivo Andrić, Bosnian Chronicle