The 70 best quotes by Antonio Gala

This veteran Spanish author talks about life, love and culture.

Antonio Gala (Ciudad Real, 1936) is one of the most prolific and outstanding writers of Spanish literature of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st century.

Playwright and poet, already at a young age he showed a great predilection for reading and the academic world, graduating in economics, philosophy and letters, political science and law.

Great quotes by Antonio Gala

Communist and freethinker, he won more than 500 awards for his magnificent and multifaceted work. We review the life and thought of one of the most respected Spaniards throughout the world.

We are going to know the best phrases of Antonio Gala and some of his most witty quotes.

Those who are not good for anything else devote themselves to politics.

Faithful to his skeptical and ironic style, he criticized the actors of Spanish politics.

2. Power is like the walnut tree, it does not allow anything to grow under its shade...

On the political structure and its yoke.

3. The bull roared with pain, bellowed with pain, filled the air, cried out to heaven in vain. The peons made him dizzy with their capes and suddenly he looked at me, with the innocence of all animals reflected in his face, but also with an imploration.

Against the barbarity of bullfighting.

4. Someone has said that the moon is so pale because it lives exclusively at night.

Great poetic phrase of the great Ciudadrealeño.

5. Everyone is heir to himself, wrote Rabelais referring to the Greek calendas. Well, we have reached them. Now nothing is as it was. Now we are faced with the great problem: we are alone and we have to choose. We are, in theory, free; we are, in theory: masters of our destiny; we have to seek our own identity through our particular experiences. Such is our primary need: to be ourselves. And it is better for us to be so without the help of others, who are so meddling. To be oneself and to be happy: what a perfect life. Perhaps the source of happiness, if there is one, lies within us. Perhaps it consists in preserving one's own self, not another, and never being another, no matter how good it may seem. Perhaps it consists in accepting oneself reflexively and docilely as one is, and unfolding oneself.

A maxim to apply to our daily life.

6. Love is the poetry of the senses. But there are very bad poetries....

Just as there are toxic and uninhabitable loves.

7. Perfect love is a friendship with erotic moments.

This is how Antonio Gala described the concept of love.

8. Pain is strongest among the strongest. Like cancer.

Unfortunately, the strong tend to endure higher levels of pain and suffering.

9. The writer, many times, is like a racehorse that has lost its jockey and no longer knows why it is running or where the finish line is, and yet it is required to keep running even though it does not know where or for what reason.

A metaphor for understanding the professional life of a writer.

10. He who does not love is always right: it is the only thing he has.

Devoid of love, human beings only find compassion in their daily misery.

11. In a rose there is room for all the springs.

The part for the whole.

12. This society makes it easy for us to make love, but not to fall in love...

Great reflection on today's society.

13. Dictatorship presents itself armored because it has to win. Democracy presents itself naked because it has to convince.

One of Antonio Gala's most applauded phrases.

14. Happiness is realizing that nothing is too important.

Nothing should take away our joy for more than a couple of minutes.

15. Religion should not exist. It should be forbidden by God, but since it doesn't exist...

A phrase he pronounced during an interview with Jesús Quinteros in Canal Sur.

16. To call such a bloody rite as a bullfight a fiesta is the opposite of calling the bloodless rite of the mass a sacrifice...

Another reflection on his opposition to the killing of bulls.

17. Nothing else is recognized in the world but wars, hatreds... not beauty.

His passion was to find beauty in the little things of everyday life.

18. No one will be able to say that a warm and happy nest will produce great people. It is inadequacy to the imperfect that improves man.

19. I am not a pessimist. I am a well-informed optimist.

Ironic reflection on optimism and pessimism.

20. Our society has reached a point where it no longer worships the golden calf, but the gold of the calf.

On the difficulty of albirar reality.

It is instructive to see how nationalists make their own bed, at the expense of the insomnia of the rest of the country. No honest mind will understand such attitudes. In order to prolong the time of blackmail, both shopkeeper Pujol and father Arzalluz encourage Gonzalez to refuse the motion of confidence (even threatening not to support him in it if he initiates it) as well as not to bring forward the general elections. Rebus sic stantibus, they will continue milking the cow. They do not mind, however (sic), to be part of the central Government, although not as "pupils". And they say it with the small mouth, while with the other one they talk to Aznar, who is their counterpart... Then, with such representatives, Catalans and Basques will want to love them.

Talking about several presidents of the Spanish government.

22. Everything a woman truly loves - a dog, a man, God, anything - she loves as a son....

If love is true, it can only be this kind of unconditional love.

23. All progress that is not human is not progress.

Interesting reflection of Antonio Gala.

24. A house is the place where one is expected.

This is how a home is recognized.

25. Live not in accordance with the ideals received, but with your aspirations, with your most vehement intuition.

The moral basis for a full life.

26. The homeland does not exist without the love of its children.

Nationalism is based on love among compatriots.

27. When you collaborate with a madman or comment on his manias, you fall into madness.

Overanalyzing the behaviors of others can make us fall into the trap.

28. Good governments are known when what they do is worth more than what their opponents say.

A maxim of Antonio Gala for good politics.

29. There are things that should not be forgiven. If God forgives them, that's up to him. I forgive with difficulty.

A point of resentment can be functional for life.

30. The privileged will always risk their complete destruction rather than give up even a small part of their privileges.

On an unequal society.

31. The book is a pole that allows unimaginable leaps in space and time; the witness of the most beautiful relay race; an infallible and intimate silent friend.

This is Antonio Gala's praise of literature.

32. I understand that the dying attract prizes.

An ironic reflection on the more than 500 awards and recognitions obtained.

33. Until a man discovers his feminine side, he will not feel complete and situated.

An avowed homosexual, Antonio Gala spoke this way about masculinity.

34. I am one of the best-selling writers in this country... and one of the least read.

Selling a lot does not mean being widely read.

35. Perhaps love is simply that: the gesture of approaching and forgetting. Each remains himself, but there are two bodies that merge.

Referring to the most basic elements of love.

36. I love my little dogs, whose barks I could distinguish from afar and whose moods I can predict, just as they can mine. Aren't my dogs and other people's dogs people?

Gala extends the meaning of the word person to dogs because of their mental capacities.

On her love for animals.

37. On this beach I loved you so much that one breath for both of us was enough.

More lyricism captured in this way of expressing the meaning of love.

38. Don't pretend anymore, don't hide the excessive hunger for me that burns in your eyes.

An invitation to let go of inhibitions.

39. When love begins, there is a moment when God is surprised to have concocted something so beautiful.

Love can be related to the divine.

40. Melancholy, like sadness, is a staining feeling. Joy seems to me to be the gift where we find ourselves.

A reflection on melancholy.

41. Embrace me in your wings so that no other air touches me but your breath, from which I live and die.

The romantic and tragic component of this way of expressing oneself is evident.

42. People feel a strange predilection for me. Because they perceive in me invalidity, loneliness, and so they love me in a special way, in a protective way.

Vulnerability can also generate attraction, according to Gala.

43. Be silent, lovers, and occupy the lip with the kiss. Do not utter vain words while your Heart is sought in another breast, panting and poor as yours, already at the edge of dawn.

Another expression of artistic sensitivity based on the theme of love.

44. To be old is to be overcome by the bitter suspicion of not mattering to anyone.

A way of looking at old age with emphasis on some social phenomena.

45. My autobiography... I should have started it recently, but I haven't started it. It was going to be entitled Self-portrait with landscape in the background, but in the end it will be called Don't move, I know the way out.

Humor makes an appearance once again in this author's reflections.

46. I have always been surrounded by women, I am very attracted to the feminine soul.

A detail about the personal life of this artist.

47. I have been vulnerable. I have been easy to hurt. I have been easy, and fragile. I have felt very deep wounds that for others would have gone unnoticed.

A life trajectory full of imperfections.

48. Without you, neither bread nor wine, nor life, nor hunger, nor the juicy color of the morning have any meaning and are of no use.

A single person can change everything.

49. Since you are invulnerable to oblivion, break me now, love, undo my breast and nestle in it, my demon and my angel.

Love can anchor itself in memories.

50. Victory hurts you, and meekly on your shoulders you carry your destiny of love, my delicate and bloody life.

An elegant soliloquy.

51. Your office is daily and decisive: as long as the sun shines, you will be ardent; as long as life lasts, you will be alive.

Great passions can also be reflected in everyday life.

52. It was by the sea, at midnight. I knew that God was there, and that the sand and you and the sea and I and the moon were God. And I adored him.

Description full of feeling.

53. I am interested in women. Besides, women are the ones who read the most. My protagonists are always women. I love them more, I admire them more, and they confide in me things they don't confide in other women.

About your appreciation for women in general.

54. Yes, I think in the abstract, that is something that literally keeps me awake at night, despite the pills I take.

A way of reading reality based on abstract ideas.

55. I just don't care about Cela's ass. What happened to his ass is his own business.

One more example of his propensity for irreverence.

56. It was winter; you came and it was summer. When the real summer comes, what will become of us?

Metaphors that speak of love and affection.

57. Who could hold, like a bridle, the unparalleled rainbow of your gaze from your light to my fallen blackness.

Another of Antonio Gala's phrases full of romanticism.

58. The truth is that this country is governed by a collection of fools.

A not very hopeful vision of the Spanish political panorama.

59. I would like to kick the theater to wake it up.

Complaints about the conformism and stagnation of this type of art.

60. I have a great capacity for admiration, surprise and curiosity, which are the three things that most define childhood.

Antonio Gala talks about several of his personal characteristics.

I don't aspire to anything, not even to be an usher at the Ministry of Culture, and I care very little about those in power.

About the kind of motivations that move him.

62. Let no judge declare my innocence, because, in this long-term process, I will only seek the life sentence of your embrace.

Emphasizing the tragic character that love sometimes adopts.

63. The woman's is the house, where the man is a guest.

A way of looking at gender roles.

64. Rajoy always made me laugh, but now I feel sorry for him.

About the former president of the government of Spain.

65. Honest politicians get out of the way when suspicion falls on them.

Another of Gala's opinions on politics.

66. How to eat without you, without the pious custom of your wings that refresh the air and renew the light?

Another of this playwright's lyricism.

67. I am not a monarchist. But I understand the work that the King has done and I feel a great personal sympathy for him.

This artist separates personal value from political value.

68. I love the word alharaca, it sounds like the nickname of a whore. Look at her, here comes La Alharaca!

A sample of his irreverent sense of humor.

69. It's not about adding years to life, but about giving life to the years.

A defense of vitalism.

70. I would not like to think if I did not think that, deprived as I was of your beauty, I would forget myself if I forgot you.

One of Antonio Gala's most romantic phrases.