Hello? Is Anybody There?
Quotes from the Book
Imagine that you were on the threshold of this fairytale, sometime billions of years ago when everything was created. And you were able to choose whether you wanted to be born to a life on this planet at some point. You wouldn’t know when you were going to be born, nor how long you’d live for, but at any event it wouldn’t be more than a few years. All you’d know was that, if you chose to come into the world at some point, you’d also have to leave it again one day and go away from everything. This might cause you a good deal of grief, as lots of people think that life in the great fairytale is so wonderful that the mere thought of it ending can bring tears to their eyes. Things can be so nice here that it’s terribly painful to think that at some point the days will run out. What would you have chosen, if there had been some higher power that had gave you the choice? Perhaps we can imagine some sort of cosmic fairy in this great, strange fairytale. What you have chosen to live a life on earth at some point, whether short or long, in a hundred thousand or a hundred million years? Or would you have refused to join in the game because you didn’t like the rules? (...) I asked myself the same question maybe times during the past few weeks. Would I have elected to live a life on earth in the firm knowledge that I’d suddenly be torn away from it, and perhaps in the middle of intoxicating happiness? (...) Well, I wasn’t sure what I would have chosen. (...) If I’d chosen never to the foot inside the great fairytale, I’d never have known what I’ve lost. Do you see what I’m getting at? Sometimes it’s worse for us human beings to lose something dear to us than never to have had it at all.
If I’d chosen never to the foot inside the great fairytale, I’d never have known what I’ve lost. Do you see what I’m getting at? Sometimes it’s worse for us human beings to lose something dear to us than never to have had it at all.
Life is short for those who are truly able to understand that one day the entire world will come to a complete end. Not everyone is capable of that. Not everyone has the ability to comprehend what going away for all eternity really implies. There are too many distractions, hour by hour, minute by minute, to hinder such an understanding.
We can't own each other's past. The question is whether we have a future together.
I'm not just some butterfly for you to catch.
Life is like a huge lottery in which only the winning tickets are visible.
I've nothing against eye make-up and lipstick. But the fact is that we’re actually living on a planet in space. For me that’s an extraordinary thought. It’s mind-boggling just to think about the existence of space at all. But there are girls who can’t see the universe for eye liner.
But the dream of something unlikely has its own special name. We call it hope.
Možda se nijedna druga vrsta intimnosti ne može uporediti sa dva polgeda koja se susreću sa istom sigurnošću i odlučnošću i jednostavnošću odbijaju da se puste.
I've nothing against eye make-up and lipstick. But the fact is we're actually living on a planet in space. For me that's an extraordinary thought. It's mind-boggling just to think about the existence of space at all. But there are girls who can't see the universe for eye-liner. And there are probably boys whose eyes are never raised above the horizon because of football. There can be quite a chasm between a small make-up mirror and a proper mirror telescope! I think it's what they call a 'matter of perspective'. Perhaps it could also be called an 'eye-opener' as well. It's never too late to experience an eye-opener. But many people live their entire lives without realizing that they're floating through empty space. There's too much going on down here. It's hard enough thinking about your looks. We belong on this earth. I'm not trying to dispute it. We're part of nature's life on this planet. Monkeys and reptiles have shown us how we breed, and I have no quarrel with that. In different natural surroundings everything might have been very different, but here we are. And I repeat: I'm not denying it. I just don't think that prevent us from trying to see a little beyond the ends of our noses.
Kakva to nedokuciva sila ukrasava zemlju cvecem u svim duginim bojama, a nocna neba kiti raskosnim vezom treperavih zvezda?
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About Jostein Gaarder
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All books by Jostein Gaarder →Book details
- Author
- Jostein Gaarder
- Genre
- Fiction
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Keep reading
Girlfriend in a Coma
We the Living
Sputnik Sweetheart
The Stone Gods
Light Years
The Sun Is Also a Star
Little Bee
Random Acts Of Heroic Love
Rooftops of Tehran
Kafka on the Shore
The Book of Goose
Rebel Angels
At the Edge of the Universe
Q & A
Beautiful Losers
The Gum Thief
Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World
The Tent
The Apocalypse of Elena Mendoza
Jeremy Fink and the Meaning of Life
Invisibility
Animal Dreams
Out of Oz
Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit
The Golden Compass
Britt-Marie Was Here
Hey Nostradamus!
Rosewater
The Moth Diaries
Spaceman of Bohemia
The Space Between Worlds
This World We Live In
The Last Star
Night Train to Lisbon
Lighthousekeeping
The Bridge Across Forever: A True Love Story
Night Watch
A Tale for the Time Being
The Solitaire Mystery
A Work in Progress
Aquarium
The Shape of Water
We Are All the Same in the Dark
Unlit Star
To Sleep in a Sea of Stars
The Fault in Our Stars
The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making
Waking Gods
The Kindly Ones
Stories of Your Life and Others
The Gone-Away World
The Hour of the Star
Robopocalypse
Holding Up the Universe
The Ground Beneath Her Feet
One
God-Shaped Hole
The Butterfly Garden
The Goldfinch
The Stardust Grail

