The 53 best quotes by Marcel Proust, the writer of nostalgia.
This French writer showed great sensitivity and interest in emotions.
Reading the most inspired quotes by Marcel Proust is a way to recognize the genius of this writer. of this writer. We are surely facing one of the most important novelists of the 19th and 20th century France, both as a brilliant writer and as an overwhelming philosophical theorist. Born in Paris into a well-to-do and traditionalist family, Valentin Louis Eugène Marcel Proust (1872 - 1922) did not have an easy life.
Already at an early age, he suffered from physical difficulties that seriously affected his health, especially caused by asthma. Then, the overprotection he received from his spouses meant a significant parental dependence, a fact that affected him when his mother died suddenly.
However, This sedentary life helped him to cultivate a passionate and imaginative inner world, which made him return to his memories again and again.that made him return to his memories again and again. This was embodied in his creativity and wisdom: even if we can hardly move out of bed, life goes on.
Marcel Proust's most memorable quotes
In this article we will give a review of the most relevant Marcel Proust's phrases of the French author..
1. Nine-tenths of the evils that people suffer, arise from their intellect.
A curious way of questioning human intelligence.
It is not only by lying to others, but also by lying to ourselves, that we stop noticing that we are lying.
It is the number one rule to know how to lie.
3. Desire makes everything flourish; possession makes everything fade away.
Proust knew firsthand what it meant to be possessive.
4. People don't know when they are happy. They are never as unhappy as they think they are.
For Marcel happiness was a lack in society.
5. The ties that bind us to another human being are sanctified when he or she takes the same point of view.
In life we relate to people who resemble us.
6. Let us give thanks to the people who make us happy; they are the delightful gardeners who make our souls bloom.
An excellent way to to be grateful to others.
7. After a certain age we pretend that we don't care about the things we want most
According to Proust, priorities change when we do not achieve the goals we set a priori.
8. One does not change, to become a different person, without ceasing to feel the feelings of the person one has ceased to be.
Marcel perfectly describes a truth that is often rejected.
9. All of our final decisions are made in a state that will not last.
Nothing is right or wrong. Everything can vary according to the moment.
10. The only true paradise is paradise lost.
Curious way to describe a place so desired by the human being.
11. We do not receive wisdom; we must discover it for ourselves.
For Marcel Proust one should attain knowledge in a self-taught way.
12. The things we desire most are the things we pretend not to desire.
We are made to dissimulate what we long for most.
13. We lie all our lives even, or especially or perhaps only, to those who love us.
In this sentence is contained the great truth of any society.
14. It is better to dream one's own life than to live it, although to live it is also to dream it.
Be that as it may, we must enjoy our day to day life.
15. The only true voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in looking with new eyes.
It all depends on how we approach change, how we look at new experiences.
16. Jealousy, which spends its time making false assumptions, when it is a question of discovering the truth.
In this phrase of Marcel Proust is perfectly decrypted such a worrying feeling for two people who love each other..
17. Happiness in love is not a normal state
Marcel Proust was a great advocate of love, but he did not confuse this state with happiness.
18. Sometimes we are too ready to believe that the present is the only possible state of things.
The French author also liked to always look beyond the everyday.
20. Ambition intoxicates more than glory
The desire to want to achieve something is very attractive and stimulating.
21. Love is space and time measured by the heart.
Excellent way to describe love.
22. For the kiss, the nose and the eyes are as badly placed as the lips are badly done.
Marcel Proust was a genius when it came to describing situations. The kiss was a phenomenon to which he paid special attention.
23. Jealousy is usually nothing more than a restless tyranny applied to the affairs of love.
Again, he makes us aware of what jealousy means.
24. Every kiss calls for another kiss
The kiss is an addictive thing between two people who love each other.
25. True happiness does not consist in finding new lands, but in seeing with different eyes.
I have already mentioned something about this, Marcel Proust insists again on how to face new experiences..
26. It would be as difficult to cut the kisses that are given in an hour as it would be to cut the flowers in a field in the month of May.
This phrase manages to describe perfectly what the act of kissing means.
27. So it is with our past. It is wasted work to want to evoke it, and useless all the efforts of our intelligence.
It is always necessary to look ahead.
28. My cowardice made me at once a man, and I did what all men who look suffering and injustice in the face would do.
Marcel had a complicated childhood and adolescence.
29. Happiness is beneficial to the body, it is Pain that develops the powers of the mind.
According to Proust we should try to be as little skeptical as possible.
30. Little by little, the memory disappearing, I had forgotten about the girl of my dreams.
An example of how the nostalgic style of nostalgic style of this writer..
31. It is often difficult to bear the tears that we ourselves have caused
Hurting others hurts us first.
32. Always try to keep a piece of heaven above your life.
Illusion and imagination make our short life a good stimulus.
33. We have the misfortune to belong to this world
The author was a little negative towards the human being.
34. If a little dreaming is dangerous, the cure for it is not to dream less, it is to dream all the time.
Even if an illusion disappoints us, we must not lose it for the future.
35. With what naturalness the kisses are born in those first times of the love!
Marcel was obsessed with kisses.
36. We are cured of a suffering only by experiencing it to the fullest.
Only by living through several bad experiences can we overcome them.
37. Dear friend, I have died almost three times since this morning.
We do not know exactly what the author means by this sentence.
38. Time, which changes people, does not alter the image we have of them.
No matter how we change or transform ourselves, it often does not change for others.
39. Love is a notable example of how little reality means to us
Great way to describe the feeling of love.
40. The time we have is elastic; the passions we feel expand it, dreams contract it; and habit fills up what remains
This was life for Marcel Proust.
41. The moment comes so soon, when there is no longer anything to wait for.
Things come, one has only to wait for them.
42. My destiny is no longer a place, but a new way of looking at life according to reality.
To face life according to the reality we project.
43. Reading is the fruitful miracle of communication in the midst of solitude.
Reading is always an advantage both personally and professionally.
44. Love, always unsatisfied, lives in the moment when it is about to arrive.
Love was a very present theme for Marcel Proust.
45. Like many intellectuals, he was incapable of saying a simple thing in a simple way.
Intellectuality sometimes makes us we do not know how to describe our thoughts well.
46. Let's leave pretty women to men without imagination.
A blunt statement which, if it had been written today, would cause controversy but which was normal in the context of Proust's time.
47. It is always so, driven by a mood that is destined not to last, we make our irrevocable decisions.
Temperament plays tricks on us on many occasions.
48. It is only through art that we can get out of ourselves and know what another person sees.
Art makes us escape, gives us illusions and cures disappointment.
49. Be wary of the man who never cries, he is often the most cowardly.
Proust was known for his openly declared Proust was known for his openly declared sensitivity, which was rare in men of his time.
50. We must be courageous in facing our own contradictions, rather than highlighting those of others.
To criticize others, we must be better.
51. To fall in love is the last vital state of our existence.
Love seems to be the final state of our life.
52. When you make an undesirable decision, do not regret it in posterity.
Marcel Proust was very little given to regret.
53. If you do not like the reality in which you live, invent it.
The author insists once again that everything depends on the point of view with which we project our reality.
(Updated at Apr 13 / 2024)