Quotes from Three Guineas

“No guinea of earned money should go to rebuilding the college on the old plan just as certainly none could be spent upon building a college upon a new plan: therefore the guinea should be earmarked "Rags. Petrol. Matches." And this note should be attached to it. "Take this guinea and with it burn the college to the ground. Set fire to the old hypocrisies. Let the light of the burning building scare the nightingales and incarnadine the willows. And let the daughters of educated men dance round the fire and heap armful upon armful of dead leaves upon the flames. And let their mothers lean from the upper windows and cry, "Let it blaze! Let it blaze! For we have done with this 'education!”
― Virginia Woolf, quote from Three Guineas

“...the value of education is among the greatest of all human values...”
― Virginia Woolf, quote from Three Guineas

“The questions that we have to ask and to answer about that procession during this moment of transition are so important that they may well change the lives of men and women forever. For we have to ask ourselves, here and now, do we wish to join that procession, or don't we? On what terms shall we join that procession? Above all, where is it leading us, the procession of educated men?...Let us never cease from thinking--what is this "civilisation" in which we find ourselves? What are these ceremonies and why should we take part in them? What are these professions and why should we make money out of them? Where in short is it leading us, the procession of the sons of educated men?”
― Virginia Woolf, quote from Three Guineas

“Though we see the same world, we see it through different eyes.”
― Virginia Woolf, quote from Three Guineas

“What we have to do now, then, Sir, is to lay your request before the daughters of educated men and to ask them to help you to prevent war, not by advising their brothers how they shall protect culture and intellectual liberty, but simply by reading and writing their own tongue in such a way as to protect those rather abstract goddesses themselves.”
― Virginia Woolf, quote from Three Guineas

“quels soucis de gloire, quel intérêt, quelles satisfactions, et elles sont nombreuses, la lutte lui apporte?
Sans la guerre il n y aurait pas de débouchés pour les nombreuses qualités viriles développées par la lutte; se battre ainsi demeure une caractéristique du sexe masculin [...] c est, disent certains la contrepartie de l instinct maternel, qu il ne peuvent, eux, partager”
― Virginia Woolf, quote from Three Guineas

“en tant que femme je n ai pas de pays.
En tant que femme je ne désire aucun pays.
Mon pays a moi, femme, c est le monde entier.”
― Virginia Woolf, quote from Three Guineas

“Feminism', we have had to destroy.”
― Virginia Woolf, quote from Three Guineas

“Tal como consta por experiencia, y hay muchos hechos que lo demuestran, las hijas de los hombres con educación siempre han ejercido el pensamiento sobre la marcha; no bajo verdes lámparas en mesas de estudio, no en claustros de aisladas universidades. Han pensado mientras vigilaban el puchero, mientras mecían la cuna. Así conquistaron para nosotras el derecho a nuestra flamante moneda de seis peniques. A nosotras nos corresponde seguir pensando. ¿Cómo vamos a gastar los seis peniques? Debemos pensar”
― Virginia Woolf, quote from Three Guineas

“Take this guinea then and use it, not to burn the house down, but to make its windows blaze. And let the daughters of uneducated women dance round the new house, the poor house, the house that stands in a narrow street where omnibuses pass and the street hawkers cry their wares, and let them sing, ‘We have done with war! We have done with tyranny!’ And their mothers will laugh from their graves, ‘It was for this that we suffered obloquy and contempt! Light up the windows of the new house, daughters! Let them blaze!”
― Virginia Woolf, quote from Three Guineas

“For,” the outsider will say, “in fact, as a woman, I have no country. As a woman I want no country.”
― Virginia Woolf, quote from Three Guineas

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“Stătea întinsă pe spate cu braţele desfăcute, ca într-o sfârşeală din dragoste ; de atâta voluptate timpul i se părea de bună seamă fără sfârşit şi cânta, mai mult în suspine, un cântecel oarecare.
Văzând că el rămâne tăcut, dus pe gânduri, tresări speriată şi începu să-l smucească apoi ca un copil, spunându-i :
- Hai, vino, aici ne sufocăm.
Se îmbrăţişară, trupul ei puţintel ardea sub mâinile lui K., se rostogoliră cu câţiva metri mai încolo într-o inconştienţă din care K. încerca mereu să se smulgă făcând eforturi zadarnice, se loviră cu un zgomot surd de uşa lui Klamm şi apoi rămaseră culcaţi în micile băltoace de bere şi în alte gunoaie răspândite pe podea. Acolo petrecură ore întregi, ore de răsuflare în comun, de bătăi de inimă comune, ore în care K. avea mereu senzaţia că se rătăceşte pe meleaguri străine sau că a ajuns atât de departe ca nimeni înaintea lui, într-o străinătate unde nici măcar aerul nu avea vreun comportament din atmosfera de acasă, unde trebuie să te sufoci de înstrăinare şi unde, împresurat de tentaţiile ei absurde, nu poţi face totuşi altceva decât să mergi înainte, să rătăceşti mai departe. Aşa că nu simţi spaimă în primul moment, ci mai degrabă o revenire consolatoare din obnubilaţie, când auzi că o voce profundă, poruncitor-calmă, o strigă pe Frieda din camera lui Klamm. "Frieda !" îi zice K. la ureche, transmiţându-i astfel chemarea. Mânată de o supunere de-a dreptul înnăscută, Frieda voia să sară în picioare, dar apoi îşi aminti unde se află, îşi întinse braţele, râse încetişor şi zise :
- Cum îţi închipui că o să mă duc. Nu mai mă duc niciodată la el.
K. voia să o contrazică, s-o convingă să se ducă la Klamm, începu să strângă de pe jos ce mai rămăsese din bluza ei, dar nu era în stare să spună nimic, era prea fericit s-o ţină pe Frieda între mâinile lui, prea fericit şi temător în acelaşi timp, căci i se păre că dacă Frieda îl părăseşte, îl părăseşte tot ce-i al lui.”
― Franz Kafka, quote from Slottet

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