Mai

“Anyone who lives in her own world is crazy. Like schizophrenics, psychopaths, maniacs. I mean people who are different from others.'
Like you?'
On the other hand,' Zedka continued, pretending not to have heard the remark, 'you have Einstein, saying that there was no time or space, just a combination of the two. Or Columbus, insisting that on the other side of the world lay not an abyss but a continent. Or Edmund Hillary, convinced that a man could reach the top of Everest. Or the Beatles, who created an entirely different sort of music and dressed like people from another time. Those people--and thousands of others--all lived in their own world.”
― Paulo Coelho, Veronika Decide Morir - Tapa Azul

“Once upon a time, powerful wizard, who wanted to destroy an entire kingdom, placed a magic potion in the well from which the inhabitants drank. Whoever drank that water would go mad.

The following morning, the whole population drank from the well and they all went mad, apart from the king and his family, who had a well set aside for them alone, which the magician had not managed to poison. The king was worried and tried to control the population by issuing a series of edicts governing security and public health. The policemen and the inspectors, however, had also drunk the poisoned water, and they thought the king’s decisions were absurd and resolved to take notice of them.

When the inhabitants of the kingdom heard these decrees, they became convinced that the king had gone mad and was now giving nonsensical orders. The marched on the castle and called for his abdication.

In despair the king prepared to step down from the throne, but the queen stopped him, saying: ‘Let us go and drink from the communal well. Then we will be the same as them.’

And that was what they did: The king and queen drank the water of madness and immediately began talking nonsense. Their subjects repented at once; now that the king was displaying such ‘wisdom’, why not allow him to rule the country?

The country continued to live in peace, although its inhabitants behaved very differently from those of its neighbors. And the king was able to govern until the end of his days.”
― Paulo Coelho, Veronika Decides to Die

“احتقرتُ نفسي سبعَ مرَّات:

الأولى، عندما رأيتُها تتظاهرُ الوضاعة وهي تنشدُ الرِّفعة.

والثانية عندما رأيتها تترنَّح متجاوزة العَرْجى.

والثالثة عندما خُيِّرتْ بين السَّهل والشَّاق ففضَّلت السَّهل.

والرابعة عندما اقترفَتْ ذنباً وراحتْ تبرِّره باقتراف الآخرين ذنوباً مماثلة.

والخامسة عندما عجِزَتْ عن فعل شيء لضعفها وعزَتْ صبرَها إلى القوَّة.

والسادسة عندما احتقرتْ بشاعة وجهٍ تبيَّن أنه أحدُ براقعها.

والسابعة عندما غنَّتْ مديحاً واعتبرتْ غناءَها فضيلة.”
― جبران خليل جبران, رمل وزبد

“Your answer is the logical, coherent answer an absolutely normal person would give: It's a tie! A lunatic, however, would say that what I have around my neck is a ridiculous, useless bit of colored cloth tied in a very complicated way, which makes it harder to get air into your lungs and difficult to turn your neck. I have to be careful when I'm anywhere near a fan, or I could be strangled by this bit of cloth.
If a lunatic were to ask me what this tie is for, I would have to say, absolutely nothing. It's not even purely decorative, since nowadays it's become a symbol of slavery, power, aloofness. The only really useful function a tie serves is the sense of relief when you get home and take it off; you feel as if you've freed yourself from something, though quite what you don't know.”
― Paulo Coelho, Veronika Decides to Die