“Why are we worn out? Why do we, who start out so passionate, brave, noble, believing, become totally bankrupt by the age of thirty or thirty-five? Why is it that one is extinguished by consumption, another puts a bullet in his head, a third seeks oblivion in vodka, cards, a fourth, in order to stifle fear and anguish, cynically tramples underfoot the portrait of his pure, beautiful youth? Why is it that, once fallen, we do not try to rise, and, having lost one thing, we do not seek another? Why?”
― Anton Chekhov, quote from The Complete Short Novels
“They say, tell me what you've read and I'll tell you who you are.”
― Anton Chekhov, quote from The Complete Short Novels
“There is something sad, dreamy, and in the highest degree poetic in a lonely grave ... You can hear its silence, and in this silence you sense the presence of the soul of the unknown person who lies under the cross. Is it good for this soul in the steppe? Does it languish”
― Anton Chekhov, quote from The Complete Short Novels
“To leave town, and the struggle and the swim of life, and go and hide yourself in a farmhouse is not life -- it is egoism, laziness; it is a kind of monasticism, but monasticism without action. A man needs, not six feet of land, not a farm, but the whole earth, all Nature, where in full liberty he can display all the properties and qualities of the free spirit.”
― Anton Chekhov, quote from The Complete Short Novels
“When you look for a long time into the deep sky, without taking your eyes away, your thoughts and soul merge for some reason in an awareness of loneliness. You begin to feel yourself irremediably alone, and all that you once considered close and dear becomes infinitely distant and devoid of value.”
― Anton Chekhov, quote from The Complete Short Novels
“So it is in life... In search of the truth, people make two steps forward and one step back. Sufferings, mistakes, and the tedium of life throw them back, but the thirst for truth and a stubborn will drive them on and on. And who knows? Maybe they’ll row their way to the real truth...”
― Anton Chekhov, quote from The Complete Short Novels
“And you know once a man has fished, or watched the thrushes hovering in flocks over the village in the bright, cool, autumn days, he can never really be a townsman, and to the day of his death he will be drawn to the country.”
― Anton Chekhov, quote from The Complete Short Novels
“There are a great many wicked people in the world," said Emelyan.”
― Anton Chekhov, quote from The Complete Short Novels
“The Russian loves recalling life, but he does not love living.”
― Anton Chekhov, quote from The Complete Short Novels
“Everything is quiet, peaceful, and against it all there is only the silent protest of statistics; so many go mad, so many gallons are drunk, so many children die of starvation. . . . And such a state of things is obviously what we want; apparently a happy man only feels so because the unhappy bear their burden in silence, but for which happiness would be impossible.”
― Anton Chekhov, quote from The Complete Short Novels
“for a crippled man like me , personal happiness was possible only in dreams.”
― Anton Chekhov, quote from The Complete Short Novels
Anton Chekhov
Born place: in Taganrog, Yekaterinoslav Governorate, Russian Empire
Born date January 29, 1860
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“To settle down, to Make Good, to sell your soul for a villa and an aspidistra! To turn into the typical little bowler-hatted sneak—Strube’s “little man”—the little docile cit who slips home by the six-fifteen to a supper of cottage pie and stewed tinned pears, half an hour’s listening-in to the B.B.C. Symphony Concert, and then perhaps a spot of licit sexual intercourse if his wife “feels in the mood!” What a fate! No, it isn’t like that that one was meant to live.”
― George Orwell, quote from Keep the Aspidistra Flying
“I'm so sorry for everything. I never wanted to hurt you or make you doubt me. I need you to trust me. I need you. Amd I love you. I want you. You know I do. I'll never stop doing any of those things until the day I die for you."
- Will”
― Courtney Allison Moulton, quote from Wings of the Wicked
“Now remember, they say if two people go together to visit the Taj Mahal, that means they will always be together. Are you ready for that?"
"Guess I'm stuck with you then.”
― Jalpa Williby, quote from Chaysing Dreams
“Underneath so many of the phenomena we see every day are only three basic actions: one is described by the simple coupling number, j; the other two by functions-P(A to B) and E(A to B)- both of which are closely related. That's all there is to it, and from it all the rest of the laws of physics come.”
― Richard Feynman, quote from QED: The Strange Theory of Light and Matter
“If there was an implicit self-hatred in trusting only your own, then how much deeper was the self-loathing that led a group of men to distrust someone for no reason other than that he was one of them?”
― Amitav Ghosh, quote from The Glass Palace
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Emily of New MoonBookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.
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