Maria > Maria's Quotes

“Don't let sleep overtake you; the world's awake within you.”
― Vasko Popa, The Little Box

“Five minutes are enough to dream a whole life, that is how relative time is.”
― Mario Benedetti

“...disbelief in magic can force a poor soul into believing in government and business....”
― Tom Robbins, Even Cowgirls Get the Blues

“What we need to question is bricks, concrete, glass, our table manners, our utensils, our tools, the way we spend our time, our rhythms. To question that which seems to have ceased forever to astonish us. We live, true, we breathe, true; we walk, we go downstairs, we sit at a table in order to eat, we lie down on a bed on order to sleep. How? Where? When? Why?

Describe your street. Describe another. Compare.”
― Georges Perec, L'infra-ordinaire

“Εκεί που χορταριάζει το χάος
πάμε και χτίζουμε σπίτια.”
― Γιάννης Στίγκας

“Γιατί η ποίηση
-ψιτ, μεγάλε-
δεν είναι αιώρα ρεμβασμών
δεν είν' το φτερωτό σου κατοικίδιο
-ψιτ, μεγάλε-
Οταν υποδύεσαι το φεγγάρι
να το υποδύεσαι και στη χάση του
-δε θα σ' το κάνω πιο λιανά-
Αν το νοείς αυτό
έχει καλώς
αλλιώς
Ε ρε Μαγιακόφσκι που σου χρειάζεται”
― Γιάννης Στίγκας, Ο δρόμος μέχρι το περίπτερο

“...then it wouldn't be a bad thing, or at least not the worst thing, to enter the third millenium asking for forgiveness right and left, and in the meantime, while we're at it, we should raise a statue of Nicanor Parra in Plaza Italia, a statue of Nicanor and another of Neruada, but with their backs turned to each other.
At this point, I foresee that more than one alleged reader will say to himself (and then run to tell his friends and relatives): Bolaño says Parra is the poet of the right and Neruda is the poet of the left.
Some people don't know how to read.”
― Roberto Bolaño, Between Parentheses: Essays, Articles, and Speeches, 1998-2003

“This afternoon it rains as never before; and I
don’t feel like staying alive, heart. This afternoon is pleasant. Why shouldn’t it be?
It is wearing grace and pain; it is dressed like a woman.”
― Cesar Vallejo

“Life is a shitstorm, in which art is our only umbrella."
(spoken by character in a novel by Mario Vargas Llosa)”
― Mario Vargas Llosa

“...we find only one tool, neither created nor invented, but perfect: the hand of man.”
― Julio Ramón Ribeyro, Marginal Voices: Selected Stories

“Τα βίτσια των αντρών
είναι η επικράτειά μου
οι πληγές τους τα γλυκίσματά μου
αγαπάω να μασώ τις χαμερπείς τους σκέψεις
γιατί η ασκήμια τους κάνει την ομορφιά μου”
― Joyce Mansour, Κραυγές - Σπαράγματα - ΄Ορνια

“Ήμουν στο σπίτι μου κι ήθελα να 'μαι στους δρόμους, ήμουν στους δρόμους και ήθελα ένα σπίτι, έμπαινα σ' ένα καφενείο κι ήθελα να 'μαι σε μια καντίνα, έφερνα ένα ποτήρι μπίρα στα χείλη μου κι ήθελα έναν καφέ, ήθελα μια γυναίκα κι έβλεπα μια πόλη.”
― Θάνος Σταθόπουλος

“Εν τέλει,καθένας έχει τον κύκλο του, αντί να σπάει τον κύκλο του.”
― Θάνος Σταθόπουλος, La Folie

“Χτυπάει ένα ρολόι απόηχος του Κάφκα.”
― Θάνος Σταθόπουλος, La Folie

“Καμιά φορά, τη νύχτα, ανάβω ένα φως για να μη βλέπω.”
― Antonio Porchia

“Κανένας δεν σταμάτησε να είναι ηλίθιος χάρη σ' ένα βιβλίο. Άπειροι ηλίθιοι άνθρωποι έχουν διαβάσει τόνους βιβλία.”
― Félix de Azúa

“A little self-knowledge is a dangerous thing.”
― Malcolm Lowry, Under the Volcano

“My destination is no longer a place, rather a new way of seeing.”
― Marcel Proust

“It is said that what is called "the spirit of an age" is something to which one cannot return. That this spirit gradually dissipates is due to the world's coming to an end. For this reason, although one would like to change today's world back to the spirit of one hundred years or more ago, it cannot be done. Thus it is important to make the best out of every generation.”
― Tsunetomo Yamamoto, Hagakure: The Book of the Samurai