Ira Constantinescu > Recent Status Updates

Isn't it rich that Don Lorenzo is said to have been delighted to be praised by Don Quixote, even though he thought he was a madman? O power of flattery, how far do you extend, and how wide are the frontiers of your pleasant realm!

Dame Fortune, once upon a day,
Was generous to me, and kind;
But what she gave she took away,
For all things change: she changed her mind,
And what she took she won't repay.
O Fortune: for a century
I've waited here on bended knee:
Just make me lucky, I implore,
I'd be a happy man once more
If only was were is for me.

the pen is the tongue of the soul, and his writings will be as are the concepts engendered in his soul.

But I also say that the natural poet who calls in art to his aid will be the better for it, and will have the advantage over the man who tries to be a poet by relying upon his knowledge of the art alone, and the reason is that art does not surpass nature but merely perfects it; so if nature and art, art and nature, are combined, the result will be a perfect poet.

you do as you please, because that's the burden we women were born with, obeying our husbands even if they are damn fools.

Men renowned for their genius - great poets, illustrious historians - are usually envied by those whose pleasure and pastime is to pass judgement on what others have written, without ever having published anything themselves.

Be that as it may, my understanding of the matter, my dear sir, is that to write histories and other books one needs a fine mind and a mature understanding. To tell jokes and write wittily is the work of geniuses; the most intelligent character in a play is the fool, because the actor playing the part of a simpleton must not be one.

Las chicas así me asquean. Me dan tanta envidia que no puedo ni hablar. A mis diecinueve años, yo no había salido de Nueva Inglaterra salvo para ese viaje a Nueva York. Era mi primera gran oportunidad, pero ahí estaba, cruzada de brazos y dejando que se me escurriera entre los dedos como el agua.

Esas chicas me parecían tremendamente aburridas. Las veía en la terraza, bostezando y pintándose las uñas e intentando mantener el bronceado de las Bermudas, y parecían aburridas a más no poder. Hablé con una de ellas, y estaba aburrida de yates y aburrida de volar en avión y aburrida de esquiar en Suiza por Navidad y aburrida de los hombres en Brasil.

'God help them,' said the priest, 'and we must stay alert: we shall soon see where this great fabric of absurdities leaves this knight and this squire
- anyone would think they'd been made in the same mould, and that the madness of the master wouldn't be worth a farthing without the foolishness of the man.'

How vain are all the hopes of humankind!
How sweet our promises of comfort seem,
And yet they end in shadow, smoke and dream!

Because on my faith, sir, the poor man is prevented from showing the virtue of liberality towards anyone, even if he possesses it to a degree; and gratitude that is restricted to good intentions is as dead as faith without works.

I still trust in God and his Blessed Mother, O flower and mirror of steeds, that we two shall soon be as we would wish to be: you with your master on your back, and I mounted upon you, practising the profession for which God sent me into this world.

So it isn't the masses who are to blame for demanding rubbish, but rather those who aren't capable of providing them with anything else.

it's better to earn a living from the many than approval from the few.

So the din died down for the time being, the pack-saddle was left as a caparison until judgement day, and the basin remained as a helmet and the inn as a castle in Don Quixote's imagination.

it's the lords that make the laws, and I’ll say no more.

time has more power to undo and change things than the human will.

'The church, the sea or the palace of the king, or, to spell it out more clearly, 'Whoever wants to prosper and be rich should either enter the church, or take up trading and go to sea, or serve a king in his palace', because, as they also say, 'Better the king's crumb than the lord's boon'.

And, if only you think about it, it will be easier for you to force yourself to love the woman who adores you than to persuade the woman who hates you to love you.

I look to death in quest of life;
I seek health in infirmity
And freedom in captivity;
I search for rest in bitter strife
And faithfulness in treachery.
But fortune always was unkind:
I know that it has been designed
By adverse fate and heaven's decree
That, since I seek what cannot be,
What can be I shall never find.

But isn't it extraordinary how this unfortunate hidalgo believes all these lies and fictions, just because they imitate the style and manner of the nonsense in his books?'
"Yes, it is strange,' said Cardenio, 'and the whole business is so weird and wonderful that I can't believe that if anyone wanted to invent such a story he'd be clever enough to do it.'

once lust has been satisfied the greatest pleasure is to escape from the scene of the fun.

I put all these arguments to him, and many others that I don't remember, but they were powerless to make him change his mind: the man who never intends to pay isn't worried about any problems when he strikes his bargain.

Yet what am I complaining about, miserable wretch that I am? It's certain that when misfortune is brought by the movements of the stars, it comes crashing down from on high with such fury and violence that there's no power on earth that can stop it, no human contrivance that can hold it back.

Long live the memory of Amadis, and let him be imitated as well as is possible by Don Quixote de la Mancha, of whom it shall be said what was said of another: if he did not achieve great things, he died in the attempt.

which would be better and more suitable, imitating Orlando and his outrageous madness, or Amadis and his melancholy madness?

I imagine that everything I say is precisely as I say it is, and I depict her in my imagination as I wish her to be, both in beauty and in rank, and Helen cannot rival her, nor can Lucretia or any other of the famous women of past ages,whether Greek,Barbarian or Roman,equal her.And people can say what they like,because if I am reproached by the ignorant for this,I shall not be punished by even the most severe judges.

I imagine that everything I say is precisely as I say it is,and I depict her in my imagination as I wish her to be,both in beauty and in rank,and Helen cannot rival her, nor can Lucretia or any other of the famous women of past ages,whether Greek,Barbarian or Roman, equal her.And people can say what they like,because if I am reproached by the ignorant for this, I shall not be punished by even the most severe judges.

I am mad, and mad I shall remain until you return with the reply to a letter that I intend to send by you to my lady Dulcinea; and should that reply be such as is due to my fidelity, then my folly and my penance will be at an end; and should it be otherwise, I shall go truly mad, and feel nothing. So however she replies I shall be free of the conflict and travail in which you will leave me.