Quotes from The Red and the Black

“A good book is an event in my life.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“A novel is a mirror walking along a main road.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“A melancholy air can never be the right thing; what you want is a bored air. If you are melancholy, it must be because you want something, there is something in which you have not succeeded.
It is shewing your inferiority. If you are bored, on the other hand, it is the person who has tried in vain to please you who is inferior.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“After moral poisoning, one requires physical remedies and a bottle of champagne.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“Love born in the brain is more spirited, doubtless, than true love, but it has only flashes of enthusiasm; it knows itself too well, it criticizes itself incessantly; so far from banishing thought, it is itself reared only upon a structure of thought.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“Indeed, man has two different beings inside him. What devil thought of that malicious touch?”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“Each man for himself in that desert of egoism which is called life.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“The ordinary procedure of the nineteenth century is that when a powerful and noble personage encounters a man of feeling, he kills, exiles, imprisons or so humiliates him that the other, like a fool, dies of grief.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“An English traveller relates how he lived upon intimate terms with a tiger; he had reared it and used to play with it, but always kept a loaded pistol on the table.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“Ah, Sir, a novel is a mirror carried along a high road. At one moment it reflects to your vision the azure skies, at another the mire of the puddles at your feet. And the man who carries this mirror in his pack will be accused by you of being immoral! His mirror shews the mire, and you blame the mirror! Rather blame that high road upon which the puddle lies, still more the inspector of roads who allows the water to gather and the puddle to form.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“I am mad, I am going under, I must follow the advice of a friend, and pay no heed to myself.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“The tyranny of public opinion (and what an opinion!) is as fatuous in the small towns of France as it is in the United States of America.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“But, if I sample this pleasure so prudently and circumspectly, it will no longer be a pleasure.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“Your career will be a painful one. I divine something in you which offends the vulgar.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“What is the use of a love that makes one yawn? One might as well take to religion.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“They were completely vague. They expressed everything and nothing. 'It is the Æolian harp of style,' thought Julien. 'Amid the most lofty thoughts about annihilation, death, the infinite, etc., I can see no reality save a shocking fear of ridicule.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“For the future, I shall rely only upon those elements of my character which I have tested. Who would ever have said that I should find pleasure in shedding tears? That I should love the man who proves to me that I am nothing more than a fool?”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“Un des moments les plus pénibles de sa vie était celui où, chaque matin, en s'éveillant, il s'apprenait son malheur.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“آدمى سخن مى گويد تا افكار خود را بيشتر پنهان كند.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“Ce iubire mai e aceea care te face sa casti?”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“C'est la violente impression du laid sur une âme faite pour aimer ce qui est beau. ”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“Prestige! Sir, is it nothing? To be revered by fools, gaped at by children, envied by the rich and scorned by the wise.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“The footman burst in, announcing, 'Monsieur le Duc de ---.'
'Hold your tongue, you fool,' said the Duke as he entered the room. He said this so well, and with such majesty than Julien could not help thinking that knowing how to lose his temper with a footman was the whole extent of this great personage's knowledge.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“...one of the traits of genius is not to drag its thought through the rut worn by vulgar minds.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

“Exalted by a sentiment of which she was proud, and that overcame all her arrogance, she was reluctant to let a moment of her life go by without occupying it with some remarkable deed.”
― Stendhal, quote from The Red and the Black

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Popular quotes

“Families are like countries. They have their own language and jokes and secrets and assumptions about the right and wrong ways of doing things, and some of that always shows in the children, the way something of
Germany or Australia always shows in a German or an Australian, no matter where they go. Outsiders like it or they don't, they feel at home there or they don't. It's like the taste of cilantro.

”
― Roland Merullo, quote from A Little Love Story

“Добродетелите се бяха превърнали в пороци, в досадни натяквания и тормоз над другите. Дългият процес на ерозия, вечната готовност да бъде на разположение на другите и безконечната грижа към най-дребните желания, нужди, събития, кризи бяха превърнали храброто младо създание в маниачка. Обсебена изцяло от незначителната страна на битието.”
― Doris Lessing, quote from The Summer Before the Dark

“Rommel could smell the sea. At Torbruk the heat and the dust and flies were as bad as they had been in the desert, but it was all made bearable by that occasional whiff of salty dampness in the faint breeze.”
― Ken Follett, quote from The Key to Rebecca

“You know, I'm really trying to cut down on this stuff. But..." Peabody ripped into the pack of cookies. "Thing is, weird, McNab doesn't think I'm chubby. And when a guy sees you naked, he knows where the extra layers are."

"Peabody, do you have some delusion that I want to hear how McNab sees you naked?"

She crunched into a cookie. "I'm just saying. Anyway, you know we have sex, so you've probably reached the conclusion we're naked when we're having it. You being an ace detective and all."

"Peabody, in the chain of command, you may, on rare occasions and due to my astonishing good nature, respond to sarcasm with sarcasm. You are not permitted to lead with it. Give me a damn cookie."

"They're coconut crunchies. You hate coconut."

"Then why did you buy coconut?"

"To piss you off." Grinning now, Peabody pulled another pack of cookies from her bag. "Then I bought chocolate chip, just for you."

"Well, hand them over then."

"Okay, so ..." Peabody ripped open the second pack, offered Eve a cookie. "Anyway, McNab's got a little, bitty butt, and hardly any shoulders. Still -- "

"Stop. Stop right there. If I get an image of a naked McNab in my head, you're going back to traffic detail."

Peabody munched, hummed, waited.

"Damn it! There he is."

Hooting with laughter, Peabody polished off the last cookie. "Sorry. Dallas, I'm sorry. I couldn't help it. Kinda cute, isn't he?”
― J.D. Robb, quote from Witness in Death

“Le mai le joli mai en barque sur le Rhin
Des dames regardaient du haut de la montagne
Vous êtes si jolies mais la barque s'éloigne
Qui donc a fait pleurer les saules riverains

Or des vergers fleuris se figeaient en arrière
Les pétales tombés des cerisiers de mai
Sont les ongles de celle que j'ai tant aimée
Les pétales flétris sont comme ses paupières

Sur le chemin du bord du fleuve lentement
Un ours un singe un chien menés par des tziganes
Suivaient une roulotte traînée par un âne
Tandis que s'éloignait dans les vignes rhénanes
Sur un fifre lointain un air de régiment

Le mai le joli mai a paré les ruines
De lierre de vigne vierge et de rosiers
Le vent du Rhin secoue sur le bord les osiers
Et les roseaux jaseurs et les fleurs nues des vignes”
― Guillaume Apollinaire, quote from Alcools

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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.

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