Quotes from Joseph Roth

I am not a man of my time. In fact I find it hard not to declare myself its enemy. Not, as I often remark, that I fail to understand it. My comment is merely a pious one. Because I am easy-going I prefer not to be aggressive or hostile and therefore I say that I do not understand those matters which I ought to say I hate or despise. I have sharp ears but I pretend to be hard of hearing, finding as I do that is more elegant to feign this handicap than to admit that I have heard some vulgar sound

The world to come will be like this triangular railroad junction, raised to some unknown power. The earth has lived through several evolutionary stages - but following always natural laws. It is presently experiencing a new one, which follows constructive, conscious, and no less elemental laws. Regret for the passing of the old forms is like the grief of some antediluvian creature for the disappearance of a prehistoric habitat.

A skyscraper is the incarnate rebellion against the supposedly unattainable; against the mystery of altitude, against the otherworldliness of the cerulean.

Because human nature will not deny its weaknesses, even where it is seemingly in the process of overcoming them.

And in the evening concealed fluorescent tubes light the room so evenly that it is no longer illuminated, it is a pool of luminosity.

Que Dios nos dé a todos los bebedores una muerte así de hermosa y fácil!»).

Lieutenant Trotta wasn't experienced enough to know that uncouth peasant boys with noble hearts exist in real life and that a lot of truths about the living world are recorded in bad books; they are just badly written.

Tu vida fue una vida llena de miseria, sin sentido. Cuando éramos jóvenes gocé tu carne. En los últimos años la he desdeñado. Tal vez fuera ése nuestro pecado. Como el calor del amor no estaba en nosotros, sino el hielo de la costumbre, todo a nuestro alrededor ha muerto, todo se atrofió y se echó a perder. Tienes suerte, Deborah. El Señor ha tenido compasión de ti.

I am no longer Mendel Singer. I am the remains of Mendel Singer.

Mira, Deborah, los vecinos vienen a verme, para consolarme. Pero a pesar de que son muchos y de que todos se estrujan el cerebro, no hallan consuelo para mi situación. Mi corazón aún late. Mis ojos aún ven. Mis miembros aún se mueven. Mis pies aún caminan. Como y bebo, rezo y respiro. Pero mi sangre se paraliza. Mis manos están marchitas. Mi corazón, vacío. Ya no soy Mendel Singer. Soy lo que queda de Mendel Singer. América nos ha matado.

Ich glaube, der Krieg hat uns verdorben. Gestehen wir, dass wir zu Unrecht zurückgekommen sind. Wir wissen so viel wie die Toten, wir müssen uns aber dumm stellen, weil wir zufällig am Leben geblieben sind.

Demek ki hayat?n?n k?rk beÅŸ y?l?n? körlük içinde yaÅŸam??t?, kendisine veya dünyaya ait hiçbir ÅŸey bilmeden.

It was as if he had only just now lost his homeland and in it Menuchim, the most faithful of all the dead, the farthest away of all the dead, the closest of all the dead.

I have committed grave sins, and the Lord has closed his eyes. I have called him an izpravnik. He has covered his ears. He is so great that our badness becomes small.

I am thankful once again to strip off an old life, as I so often have during these years. I look back upon a soldier, a murderer, a man almost murdered, a man resurrected, a prisoner, a wanderer.

Alla scuola dei cadetti non si è mai imparato nulla su come un ufficiale debba comportarsi in un caso simile

Perhaps one can see one's destiny accomplished before one's very eyes and still feel hungry.

She wasn't the first, nor the last. These are the women he crosses paths with. He doesn't become her destiny, nor she his. They are his episodes, and luckily he too is just an episode. He wanders along on the fringes of danger, and nibbles at them.

Gradually she got used to seeing men come and go: a race of childish giants, resembling clumsy mammoth insects, fleeting and yet weighty; an army of awkward fools who tried to flutter with leaden wings; warriors who believed that they had conquered when they were despised, that they possessed when they were ridiculed, that they had enjoyed when they had barely tasted; a barbaric horde, for whom she nevertheless waited lifelong.

Dazzled by the luminosity of logic, she leans back, closing her eyes. She loses herself, she is lost.

A puff of wind blew out their skirts, and they looked like two wandering flags.

The windows in the soup kitchen are never opened, and for that reason the aroma of old meals lingers in corners and rises from the table tops - which are never washed - when the steam from the freshly cooked food brings them back to life.

Ich will damit sagen, daß man, wenn man genau achtgeben würde, unbedingt zu dem Resultat kommen müßte, daß alle sogenannten großen, historischen Ereignisse in Wahrheit zurückzuführen sind auf irgendein Moment im Privatleben ihrer Urheber oder auf mehrere Momente.

They talk about prohibition in America. What can one do in a country such as that?    'What does one do in America when one is sad - without alcohol?' asks Zwonimir.