Max Downey

“We need the tonic of wildness...At the same time that we are earnest to explore and learn all things, we require that all things be mysterious and unexplorable, that land and sea be indefinitely wild, unsurveyed and unfathomed by us because unfathomable. We can never have enough of nature.”
― Henry David Thoreau, Walden: Or, Life in the Woods

“In respect to mankind we all of us have but one task. To help mankind as a whole make some small advance, to better a particular institution, to do away with one particular mode of killing - all these are commendable, but they are not my task and yours. Our task as men is this: in our own unique personal lives, to take a short step on the road from animal to man.”
― Hermann Hesse, If the War Goes on: Reflections on War and Politics

“Hay una literatura para cuando estás aburrido. Abunda. Hay una literatura para cuando estás calmado. Esta es la mejor literatura, creo yo. También hay una literatura para cuando estás triste. Y hay una literatura para cuando estás alegre. Hay una literatura para cuando estás ávido de conocimiento. Y hay una literatura para cuando estás desesperado. Esta ultima es la que quisieron hacer Ulises Lima y Belano.”
― Roberto Bolaño, The Savage Detectives

“I wanted only to live in accord with the promptings which came from my true self. Why was that so very difficult?”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian: Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend