“It suddenly occurred to me that every move on the chessboard is old and has been played by somebody at some time. Maybe our own history has been played out by somebody at some time, and we just move our pieces about in the same moves to strike in the same way as people have always done.”
― Karel Čapek, quote from War with the Newts
“It is a well–known fact that the greater a man is the less he has on his door–plate.”
― Karel Čapek, quote from War with the Newts
“Besides, people never regard anything that serves and benefits them as mysterious; only the things which damage or threaten them are mysterious.”
― Karel Čapek, quote from War with the Newts
“They all had a thousand good economic and political reasons why they couldn’t stop. I’m not a politician or a businessman; how am I supposed to persuade them about these things. What are we supposed to do; quite likely the world will collapse and disappear under water; but at least that will happen for political and economic reasons we can all understand, at least it will happen with the help of science, technology and public opinion, with human ingenuity of all sorts! Not some cosmic catastrophe but just the same old reasons to do with the struggle for power and money and so on. There’s nothing we can do about that.”
― Karel Čapek, quote from War with the Newts
“«На сцене — пятый акт трагедии человечества, — так начал свой труд Вольф Мейнерт. — Не будем обманываться его лихорадочной предприимчивостью и технической вооруженностью; это лишь предсмертный румянец на лице организма, уже отмеченного печатью гибели. Никогда еще человечество не переживало столь благоприятной конъюнктуры для его существования; однако же — покажите мне хоть одного человека, который был бы счастлив, хоть один класс, который был бы доволен своим положением, или нацию, которая не ощущала бы угрозы для себя. Мы окружены всеми дарами цивилизации, поистине крезовым богатством духовных и материальных ценностей, — однако нас все больше и больше охватывает неотвратимое чувство неуверенности, беспокойства и надвигающейся беды». Немилосердно”
― Karel Čapek, quote from War with the Newts
“Too cheap, my dear fellow. Must Nature always be asked to straighten out the mess that man has made? And so, even you don't believe now that they could help themselves? So you see, you see; at the end you would again like to rely on someone or something to save you!”
― Karel Čapek, quote from War with the Newts
“Gentlemen, four-fifths of the earth's surface is covered by seas; that is unquestionably too much; the world's surface, the map of oceans and dry land, must be corrected. We shall give the world the workforce of the sea, gentlemen. This will no longer be the style of Captain van Toch; we shall replace the adventure story of pearls by the hymnic paean of labour.”
― Karel Čapek, quote from War with the Newts
“И что же, вы думаете, они настолько безумны, чтобы, захватив мировое господство, пощадить человека? Вы считаете, что они повторят историческую ошибку человека, которую он допускал с незапамятных времен, — покорять поверженные им нации и классы, вместо того чтобы их истреблять? Человек из чувства гордыни постоянно создавал новые различия между людьми, чтобы затем, обуянный великодушием и идеализмом, снова и снова пытаться их преодолеть. Нет, утверждал Вольф Мейнерт, такой исторической нелепицы саламандры не допустят, хотя бы потому, что ознакомятся с предостережением в моей книге! Они станут наследниками всей человеческой цивилизации; владельцами всего, что делали мы, чего мы стремились достичь, пытаясь покорить мир; но они стали бы врагами себе, если бы вместе со всем этим наследием они захотели бы оставить в живых и нас. Если саламандры хотят сохранить свою однородность, им необходимо избавиться от людей. Если они не сделают этого, рано или поздно мы распространим среди них свойственную нам разрушительную двойственность: способность создавать различия, а затем страдать от них. Но не стоит этого опасаться: сегодня очевидно, что ни одно существо, которое продолжит за человека его историю, не будет повторять его самоубийственных сумасбродств.”
― Karel Čapek, quote from War with the Newts
“So you see. If only the Newts were fighting-men, then perhaps something might be done; but men against men - that, my friend, can't be stopped.”
― Karel Čapek, quote from War with the Newts
“His life was now the life of a collector, and that gave it meaning. Evening after evening he would count and arrange his cuttings under the indulgent eyes of Mrs. Povondra who knew that every man is partly mad and partly a little child; it was better for him to play with his cuttings than to go out drinking and playing cards. She even made some space in the scullery for all the boxes he had made himself for his collection; could anything more be asked of a wife?”
― Karel Čapek, quote from War with the Newts
“V holandských koloniích žádní čerti nejsou; jsou-li nějací, tedy ve francouzských.
kapitán J. van Toch”
― Karel Čapek, quote from War with the Newts
“... dünya belli ki çöküp sular altında kalacak; ama en azından hepimizin anlayabildiği türden politik ve ekonomik nedenleri olacak bunun, en azından bilim, teknoloji ve kamuoyunun yardımıyla, türlü türlü insan icadının yardımıyla olacak. Kozmik bir felaketle değil, o bildik iktidar mücadelesi, para filan gibi nedenlerle olacak. Yapabileceğimiz bir şey yok bu konuda.”
― Karel Čapek, quote from War with the Newts
“Hay personas que coleccionan sellos; otras impresos antiguos. El señor Povondra [...] buscó durante largos años un complemento a su vida; [...] pero una tarde, cuando menos lo esperaba, se presentó en su vida lo que le faltaba para hacerla completa. Las grandes cosas, por lo general, ocurren de repente (p.111).
- Préstame las tijeras [...]. Voy a recortar todo lo que publican los periódicos sobre esas salamandras, para dejar cuando muera algún recuerdo mío.
Y así fue como el señor Povondra empezó a recoger los recortes que hablaban sobre las salamandras. [...] No ocultaremos que, después de cierto nerviosismo sufrido en los primeros días, aprendió en su café preferido a recortar de los periódicos que allí tenían a disposición de la clientela todos los artículos que trataban sobre las salamandras, y eso, en las mismas narices del camarero, sin que éste se diese cuenta y con la habilidad de un prestidigitador. Como se sabe, todos los coleccionistas estarían dispuestos a robar o asesinar con tal de conseguir algo nuevo para su colección. Pero esto no rebaja, de ninguna manera, su carácter moral.
Ahora tenía ya un sentido su vida, porque era la vida de un coleccionista (p.113).”
― Karel Čapek, quote from War with the Newts
“Они выбросили из человеческой цивилизации все, что не было подчинено какой-то практической цели, что было связано с игрой, фантазией или древностью, — и тем самым лишили ее всего человеческого, переняв только голый утилитаризм, техническую и практическую ее сторону. И вот эта-то убогая карикатура на человеческую цивилизацию процветает — создает технические чудеса, обновляет нашу старую планету и, в конце концов, начинает вдохновлять само человечество. Фауст теперь будет учиться секретам успеха и посредственности у своего ученика и слуги! Или”
― Karel Čapek, quote from War with the Newts
“The earth will probably sink and drown; but at least it will be the result of generally acknowledged political and economic ideas, at least it will be accomplished with the help of the science, industry, and public opinion, with the application of all human ingenuity! No cosmic catastrophy, nothing but state, official, economic, and other causes. Nothing can be done to prevent it.”
― Karel Čapek, quote from War with the Newts
“Stop it now! D’you think I can work miracles? What must be will be. Let everything take its inexorable course! There’s some kind of consolation even in this: that whatever is happening follows its own inevitability and its own law.”
― Karel Čapek, quote from War with the Newts
Karel Čapek
Born place: in Malé Svatoňovice, Czech Republic
Born date January 9, 1890
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“Haven sighed. Then shrugged. "He's the best man I know, but he believes himself to be the worst. He sees himself as some...monster." She narrowed her eyes, watching Cole, thinking how best to help him. "I don't know how to change that.”
― Ronie Kendig, quote from Crown of Souls
“Now her hair is like the nights of disunion and separation and her face like the days of union and delectation; She hath a nose like the edge of the burnished blade and cheeks like purple wine or anemones blood-red: her lips as coral and carnelian shine and the water of her mouth is sweeter than old wine; its taste would quench Hell's fiery pain. Her tongue is moved by wit of high degree and ready repartee: her breast is a seduction to all that see it (glory be to Him who fashioned it and finished it!); and joined thereto are two upper arms smooth and rounded; She hath breasts like two globes of ivory, from whose brightness the moons borrow light, and a stomach with little waves as it were a figured cloth of the finest Egyptian linen made by the Copts, with creases like folded scrolls, ending in a waist slender past all power of imagination; based upon back parts like a hillock of blown sand, that force her to sit when she would fief stand, and awaken her, when she fain would sleep, And those back parts are upborne by thighs smooth and round and by a calf like a column of pearl, and all this reposeth upon two feet, narrow, slender and pointed like spear-blades, the handiwork of the Protector and Requiter, I wonder how, of their littleness, they can sustain what is above them.”
― quote from The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night
“Argentine was a hard king to serve. He had a barbed whip for a tongue and it drew blood whenever he spoke.”
― Jeff Wheeler, quote from The Queen's Poisoner
“But you decided I was going to fail before I even had the chance to try.”
― Helen Harper, quote from Slouch Witch
“Come get your apples! Chernobyl apples!’ Someone told her not to advertise that, no one will buy them. ‘Don’t worry!’ she says. ‘They buy them anyway. Some need them for their mother-in-law, some for their boss.”
― Svetlana Alexievich, quote from Voces de Chernóbil: Crónica del futuro
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