Quotes from Bohumil Hrabal

Dad almost delighted at how the graves had resisted, how they had had to bring caterpillar tractors, how the chains had burst, but in the end they had succeeded, they had to succeed in tearing those old times out of the ground...

When my eye lands on a real book and looks past the printed word, what it sees is disembodied thoughts flying through air, gliding on air, living off air, returning to air, because in the end everything is air, just as the host is and is not the blood of Christ.

It never ceased to amaze me, until suddenly one day I felt beautiful and holy for having had the courage to hold on to my sanity after all I'd seen and been through, body and soul, in too loud a solitude, and slowly I came to the realization that my work was hurtling me headlong into an infinite field of omnipotence.

Kora?ao am, a nitko se nije pojavljivao,niti na putu, niti na prozorima, niti na balkonima, bilo je tiho, samo se u zraku ?uo šum vjetra koji je mirisao i kojega se dalo jesti poput sladoleda, poput nevidljivog tucanog snijega, bezmalo se mogao jesti žli?icom, imao sam dojam da, kada bih si uz njega uzeo pecivo ili komad kruha, da bih ga se mogao najesti skoro kao mlijeka.

I always loved twilight: it was the only time I had the feeling that something important could happen.

the melancholy of a world eternally under construction...

and we seemed to be saying good-bye from trains rushing in opposite directions

b?d? mia? okazj? dokona? wielkiego czynu, nie jestem ju? bowiem zwi?d?? lili?...

smiling, because my briefcase is full of books and that very night I expect them to tell me things about myself I don't know.

Bez przerwy pi? nie mo?na. Dlatego si? dokszta?cam".

Perché io mi posso permettere quel lusso di essere abbandonato, anche se io abbandonato non lo sono mai, io sono soltanto solo per poter vivere in una solitudine popolata di pensieri, perché io sono un po' uno spaccone dell'infinito e dell'eternità e l'infinito e l'eternità forse hanno un debole per le persone come me.

as if climbing down a ladder

All we wanted was to go on living like that forever.

Suntem asemeni maslinelor, cand suntem striviti, dam din noi tot ce avem mai bun.

I pop a beautiful sentence into my mouth and suck it like a fruit drop.

Because when I read, I don't really read; I pop a beautiful sentence into my mouth and suck it like a fruit drop, or I sip it like a liqueur until the thought dissolves in me like alcohol, infusing brain and heart and coursing on through the veins to the root of each blood vessel.

I can be by myself because I'm never lonely; I'm simply alone, living in my heavily populated solitude, a harum-scarum of infinity and eternity, and Infinity and Eternity seem to take a liking to the likes of me.

No book worth its salt is meant to put you to sleep, it's meant to make you jump out of your bed in your underwear and run and beat the author's brains out.

My education has been so unwitting I can't quite tell which of my thoughts come from me and which from my books, but that's how I've stayed attuned to myself and the world around me for the past thirty-five years. Because when I read, I don't really read; I pop a beautiful sentence into my mouth and suck it like a fruit drop, or I sip it like a liqueur until the thought dissolves in me like alcohol, infusing brain and heart and coursing on through the veins to the root of each blood vessel.

He was a gentle and sensitive soul, and therefore had a short temper, which is why he went straight after everything with an ax...

It's interesting how young poets think of death while old fogies think of girls.

I always loved twilight: it was the only time of day I had the feeling that something important could happen. All things were more beautiful bathed in twilight, all streets, all squares, and all the people walking through them; I even had the feeling that I was a handsome young man, and I liked looking at myself in the mirror, watching myself in the shop windows as I strode along, and even when I touched my face, I felt no wrinkles at my mouth or forehead.

Lost in my dreams, I somehow cross at the traffic signals, bumping into street lamps or people, yet moving onward, exuding fumes of beer and grime, yet smiling, because my briefcase is full of books and that very night I expect them to tell me things about myself I don't know.

Ten times a day, every day, I wonder at having wandered so far, and then, alienated from myself, a stranger to myself, I go home