Quotes from The Piano Teacher

“Every day, a piece of music, a short story, or a poem dies because its existence is no longer justified in our time. And things that were once considered immortal have become mortal again, no one knows them anymore. Even though they deserve to survive.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Vice is basically the love of failure.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Art and order, the relatives that refuse to relate.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“The first thing a proprietor learns, and painfully at that, is: Trust is fine, but control is better.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Sunday, the day for the language of leisure.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“most expensive originals have cheap imitations.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“No art can possibly comfort HER then, even though art is credited with so many things, especially an ability to offer solace. Sometimes, of course, art creates the suffering in the first place.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“simple people. . . . listen to music with their hearts and enjoy it more than those who are spoiled, jaded, blase.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Sicherheit erzeugt Angst vor dem Unsicheren.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“the ignorant majority, which does however possess one thing in abundance: It is raring for a fight.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Strictly speaking, there are no holidays for art; art pursues you everywhere, and that's just fine with the artist.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Manchmal scheitern wir in der Tat, und ich glaube fast, dieses prinzipielle Scheitern ist unser letztes Ziel.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Wer suchet, der findet Anstößiges, auf das er insgeheim hofft.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Her body is one big refrigerator, where Art is well stored.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Only the TV sounds are real, they are the actual events. All the people around here experience the same things at the same time, except for some loner, who switches to the educational channel.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Gleich wird sie dieses Stück ihres Lebens bei einer Freundin und bei Rindfleisch mit Fisolen repetieren, das Leben gleichsam um diese kleine Spanne des darüber Berichtens verlängern, wäre nicht die Zeit während ihrer Erzählung, die ja ihrerseits unaufhaltsam verstreicht. Und der Dame damit Raum für neues Erleben nimmt.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Der Herdeninstinkt schätzt ja überhaupt das Mittlere hoch ein. Er preist es als wertvoll. Sie glauben, sie seien stark, weil sie die Mehrheit bilden. In der mittleren Schicht gibt es keinen Schrecken, keine Furcht. Aneinanderdrängen sie sich um der Illusion von Wärme willen. Mit nichts ist man im Mittleren allein, mit sich selbst schon gar nicht.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Vorsorge ist besser als das Nachsehen zu haben.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Schein geht vor Sein [...]. Ja, die Realität ist wahrscheinlich einer der schlimmsten Irrtümer überhaupt. Lüge geht demnach vor Wahrheit [...]. Das Irreale kommt vor dem Realen. Und die Kunst gewinnt dabei an Qualität.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Halbwüchsige [...], die sich in der Welt schon abgehärtet haben, aber noch keine Verantwortung tragen, auch für ihre Körper nicht. Sie vertragen es, wenn Unten einmal Oben ist und umgekehrt.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Es gibt sicher schönere Gegenden zum Reiten, doch nirgendwo wird man von so vielen unschuldigen Familien mit unschuldigen Kindern und Hunden an der Leine bestaunt, die sagen: Jö ein Pferterl, auf dem auch sie gern reiten möchten, wofür sie eine Ohrfeige bekommen, wenn sie zu lautstark insistieren. Das können wir uns nicht leisten. Zum Ersatz wird dann der Bub oder das Mädel auf das schaukelnde Plastikpferd vom Ringelspiel gepflanzt, wo sie gellend weiterplärren. Daraus könnte das Kind etwas lernen, nämlich dass es für die meisten Dinge billige Kopien gibt, die ihm vorbehalten bleiben.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Der Künstler geht dem bitteren Schenkeldruck der Wahrheit wie dem der Regel gern aus dem Weg.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“The Ph.D is one of the chosen who know that some things can never be fathomed, no matter how hard you try. What good are explanations? There is no possibility of explaining how such a work [Mozart's Requiem, in the instance] could ever have come into being. (The same holds true for certain poems, which should not be analyzed either.)”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“She will prolong her life by the length of her story, even though time will wear on inexorably as she tells it, thus depriving her of the chance to have a new experience.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“ONA se oseća isključeno iz svega, jer je isključena iz svega. Drugi idu dalje, čak se i penju preko nje. Tako malu prepreku predstavlja ona. Putnik odlazi, ali ona ostaje, kao mastan papir od sendviča, da leži na putu, u najboljem slučaju malo vijori na vetru. Papir ne može daleko, on truli na licu mesta. To truljenje zahteva godine, godine bez promena.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“[D]amit das Kind den Weg durch Intrigen auch findet, schlägt sie an jeder Ecke Wegweiser in den Boden und Erika gleich mit, wenn diese nicht üben will.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Էրիկան նման է սաթի միջի միջատի՝ ժամանակից դուրս, տարիքից դուրս: Էրիկան պատմություն չունի, և նա ուրիշի պատմությունների մեջ չի խառնվում: Այս միջատը լիովին կորցրել է վազելու և սողալու ընդունակությունը: Էրիկան ապրում է անսահմանության կոճղակաղապարի մեջ տապակված:”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Der bequeme Fernsehstuhl breitet weit die Arme aus, leise ertönt die Signation zur Zeit im Bild, nüchtern regt sich der Nachrichtensprecher über seiner Krawatte. Auf dem Beistelltisch in beispielgebender Fülle und Buntheit eine sortierte Schüsselsammlung mit Naschereien, aus der sich die Damen abwechselnd oder zugleich bedienen. Wenn sie leer ist, wird sie sogleich nachgefüllt, es ist wie im Schlaraffenland, wo auch nichts zuende geht und nichts anfängt.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Với tâm trạng hồ hởi, Erika nói suy cho cùng bản chất của tình yêu cũng chính là cực điểm của sự tầm thường.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

“Người đàn bà có thôi thúc trao tặng tất cả tình yêu và giữ tỉ giá.”
― Elfriede Jelinek, quote from The Piano Teacher

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Popular quotes

“The woman stayed on her stool, silent, concentrating, watching the man's movements with an air of declining sadness. Watching him as a lamp about to go out might have looked at a man.”
― Gabriel García Márquez, quote from Innocent Erendira and Other Stories

“Thomas,” Inez interrupted with exasperation. “I’m trying to tell you I love you.” “You do?” he asked, a smile spreading halfway across his face. “But then why did you tell Terri that you wanted to delay the turn?” “It wasn’t you. It was because of the pain involved,” she said with a grimace and then admitted, “I don’t like pain, Thomas. I mean I’m practically phobic about it. My whole life, I’ve avoided any situation that might involve pain. My dentist even has to gas me to fill a cavity.” Inez shrugged unhappily. “I probably would have delayed and put it off as long as I possibly could if you hadn’t had to change me to save my life. In truth, Blondie probably did us both a favor by precipitating the events that forced you to turn me.”
― Lynsay Sands, quote from Vampires are Forever

“At the bottom of the Mariana Trench, where the water is freezing and dark, a great black Serpent sleeps in the mud.”
― Kylie Chan, quote from White Tiger

“Worldwide Long Range Solutions Special Interest Group [ ¤ SIG AeR.WLRS 253787890.546]. Space Colonization Subgroup. Open discussion board.

Okay, so imagine we get past the next few rough decades and finally do what we should have back in TwenCen. Say we mine asteroids for platinum, discover the secrets of true nanotechnology, and set Von Neumann "sheep" grazing on the moon to produce boundless wealth. To listen to some of the rest of you, all our problems would then be over. The next step, star travel, and colonization of the galaxy, would be trivial.

But hold on! Even assuming we solve how to maintain long-lasting ecologies in space and get so wealthy the costs of star-flight aren't crippling, you've still got the problem of time.

I mean, most hypothetical designs show likely starships creeping along at no more than ten percent of the speed of light, a whole lot slower than those sci-fi cruisers we see zipping on three-vee. At such speeds it may take five, ten generations to reach a good colony site. Meanwhile, passengers will have to maintain villages and farms and cranky, claustrophobic grandkids, all inside their hollowed-out, spinning worldlets.

What kind of social engineering will that take? Do you know how to design a closed society that'd last so long without flying apart? Oh, I think it can be done. But don't pretend it'll be simple!

Nor will be solving the dilemma of gene pool isolation. In the arks and zoos right now, a lot of rescued species are dying off even though the microecologies are right, simply because too few individuals were included in the original mix. For a healthy gene pool you need diversity, variety, heterozygosity.

One thing's clear, no starship will make it carrying only one racial group. What'll be needed, frankly, are mongrels… people who've bred back and forth with just about everybody and seem to enjoy it.”
― David Brin, quote from Earth

“Well, it’s no wonder you nearly managed to freeze to death the way you spend all your energy moving your mouth.”
― David Gaider, quote from The Stolen Throne

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BookQuoters 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.

We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.

Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.