Alba

“Can you experience nostalgia for something that hasn’t happened? We talk of ‘regrets’ about the course of our lives, when we are almost certain we have taken the wrong decision; but one can also be enveloped in a sweet and mysterious euphoria, a sort of nostalgia for what might have been.”
― Antoine Laurain, The Red Notebook

“That was exactly what Tabucchi was suggesting with his title ("La Nostalgie du Possible") --that we can pass right by something very important: love, a job, moving to another city or another country. Or another life. 'Pass by' and at the same time be 'so close' that sometimes, while in that state of melancholy that is akin to hypnosis, we can, in spite of everything, manage to grab little fragments of what might have been. Like catching snatches of a far-off radio frequency. The message is obscure, yet by listening carefully you can still catch snippets of the soundtrack of the life that never was. You hear sentences that were never actually said, you hear footsteps echoing in places you've never been to, you can make out the surf on a beach whose sand you have never touched. You hear the laughter and loving words of a woman though nothing ever happened between you. The idea of an affiar with her had crossed your mind. Perhaps she would have liked that --probably, in fact-- but nothing every happened. For some unknown reason, we never gave in to the exquisite vertigo that you feel when you move those few centimeters towards the face of the other for the first kiss.”
― Antoine Laurain, The Red Notebook

“Qu'est-ce qu'une aristocrate? C'est une femme que la vulgarité n'atteint pas bien qu'elle en soit cernée.”
― Muriel Barbery, The Elegance of the Hedgehog

“A quote from Sacha Guitry came to mind: 'Watching someone sleep is like reading a letter that is not addressed to you.”
― Antoine Laurain, The Red Notebook