Salem Faa > Salem's Quotes

“Practice love on animals first; they react better and more sensitively.”
― G.I. Gurdjieff

“Life is not a problem to be solved, but a reality to be experienced.”
― Soren Kierkegaard

“People understand me so poorly that they don't even understand my complaint about them not understanding me.”
― Søren Kierkegaard, The Journals of Kierkegaard

“There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn't true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true.”
― Soren Kierkegaard

“It is perfectly true, as philosophers say, that life must be understood backwards. But they forget the other proposition, that it must be lived forwards.”
― Søren Kierkegaard

“The most painful state of being is remembering the future, particularly the one you'll never have.”
― Søren Kierkegaard

“It is impossible to exist without passion”
― Søren Kierkegaard

“I have just now come from a party where I was its life and soul; witticisms streamed from my lips, everyone laughed and admired me, but I went away — yes, the dash should be as long as the radius of the earth's orbit ——————————— and wanted to shoot myself.”
― Søren Kierkegaard

“I feel as if I were a piece in a game of chess, when my opponent says of it: That piece cannot be moved.”
― Soren Kierkegaard

“...why bother remembering a past that cannot be made into a present?”
― Søren Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling

“An intellectual? Yes. And never deny it. An intellectual is someone whose mind watches itself. I like this, because I am happy to be both halves, the watcher and the watched. "Can they be brought together?" This is a practical question. We must get down to it. "I despise intelligence" really means: "I cannot bear my doubts.”
― Albert Camus

“Her hand touched me at the wrist. "If I gave you my life, you would drop it. Wouldn't you?"

I didn't say anything.”
― Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient

“She had grown older. And he loved her more now than he had loved her when he understood her better, when she was the product of her parents. What she was now was what she herself had decided to become.”
― Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient

“This was the time in her life that she fell upon books as the only door out of her cell. They became half her world.”
― Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient

“Do you understand the sadness of geography?”
― Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient

“Men had always been the reciters of poetry in the desert.”
― Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient

“Tell me, is it possible to love someone who is not as smart as you are? ...But isn't it important for you to think she is smarter than you in order to fall in love? ...Why is that? Because we want to know things, how the pieces fit. Talkers seduce, words direct us into corners. We want more than anything to grow and change. Brave new world.”
― Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient

“How can you smile as though your whole life hasn't capsized”
― Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient

“My darling, I'm waiting for you — how long is a day in the dark, or a week? The fire is gone now, and I'm horribly cold. I really ought to drag myself outside but then there would be the sun. . . I'm afraid I waste the light on the paintings and on writing these words. We die, we die rich with lovers and tribes, tastes we have swallowed, bodies we have entered and swum up like rivers, fears we have hidden in, like this wretched cave. We are the real countries, not the boundaries drawn on maps with the names of powerful men. I know you will come and carry me out into the palace of winds. That's all I've wanted — to walk in such a place with you, with friends, on earth without maps...”
― Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient

“I am not in love with him, I am in love with ghosts. So is he, he's in love with ghosts.”
― Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient

“In the desert the most loved waters, like a lover's name, are carried blue in your hands, enter your throat. One swallows absence.”
― Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient

“Everything that ever happened to me that was important happened in the desert.”
― Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient

“The trouble with words is that you can really talk yourself into a corner. You can't fuck yourself into a corner.
"That's a man talking," muttered Hana.”
― Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient

“Give me a map and I'll build you a city.”
― Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient

“أريدها لا تعرفني ولا أعرفها، لا من شيءٍ إلا لأنها تعرفني وأعرفها.. تتكلم ساكتةً وأرد عليها بسكوتي. صمتٌ ضائعٌ كالعبث ولكن له في القلبين عمل كلامٍ طويل”
― مصطفى صادق الرافعي, أوراق الورد

“وقد خلق النساء لامتحان جنون الرجال، وخلق الرجال لامتحان عقول النساء”
― مصطفى صادق الرافعي, رسائل الأحزان

“الانسان يبتلى ثم يبتلى ليعرف ان كل مافيه ان هو الا وديعة الغيب فيه ,
فما شاء الله نفع وان كان سبب من الضر , وما شاء الله ضر وان لم يكن الا نفعا”
― مصطفى صادق الرافعي, رسائل الأحزان

“ياليل : هيجت أشواقا أداريها .....فسل بها البدر :إن البدر يدريها”
― مصطفى صادق الرافعي, أوراق الورد

“يا عجبا لضمير المرأة يظل في ليل دامس من ذنوبها ثم تلمع له دمعة طاهرة في عينيها فتكون كنجمة في القطب.. يعرف بها كيف يتجه وكيف كان ظلاله.. وكأن الله ما سلط الدموع على النساء إلا لتكون هذه الدموع ذريعة من ذرائع الإنسانية تحفظ الرقة في مثال الرقة كما جعل البحار في الأرض وسيلة من وسائل الحياة عليها تحفظ الروح والنشاط لها”
― مصطفى صادق الرافعي, السحاب الأحمر

“والبِنْت قِطعةٌ من أُمها ، ولكِنها في الحُزن على أبيها أو أَخيها بِعدة أُمهات”
― مصطفى صادق الرافعي, السحاب الأحمر