Quotes from Antonio Tabucchi

I don't go for people who lead full and satisfying lives.

My books are about losers, about people who've lost their way and are engaged in a search.

The most important basis of any novel is wanting to be someone else, and this means creating a character.

I claim the right to take a stand once in a while.

Philosophy appears to concern itself only with the truth, but perhaps expresses only fantasies, while literature appears to concern itself only with fantasies, but perhaps it expresses the truth.

I live quietly at home among my family and friends.

Like a blazing comet, I've traversed infinite nights, interstellar spaces of the imagination, voluptuousness and fear.

Xenophobia manifests itself especially against civilizations and cultures that are weak because they lack economic resources, means of subsistence or land. So nomadic people are the first targets of this kind of aggression.

In a novel, my feelings and sense of outrage can find a broader means of expression which would be more symbolic and applicable to many European countries.

An intellectual is going to have doubts, for example, about a fundamentalist religious doctrine that admits no doubt, about an imposed political system that allows no doubt, about a perfect aesthetic that has no room for doubt.

My job is to look at what politics is doing, not be a politician myself.

I prefer insomnia to anaesthesia.

I don't want to promote my own image either. I don't like going on television or mixing in literary circles.

People with lots of doubts sometimes find life more oppressive and exhausting than others, but they're more energetic - they aren't robots.

No, I'm happy to go on living the life I've chosen. I'm a university teacher and I like my job.

Literature is my life of course, but from an ontological point of view. From an existential point of view, I like being a teacher.

Literature is my life of course, but from an ontological point of view. From an existential point of view, I like being a teacher.

No, I'm happy to go on living the life I've chosen. I'm a university teacher and I like my job.

My job is to look at what politics is doing, not be a politician myself.

I live quietly at home among my family and friends.

Literature for me isn't a workaday job, but something which involves desires, dreams and fantasy.

we're a southern people, Pereira, and we obey whoever shouts the loudest and gives the orders.

Rather than regret for what I have written, I feel regret for what I shall never be able to read.

La filosofía parece ocuparse sólo de la verdad, pero quizá no diga más que fantasías, y la literatura parece ocuparse sólo de fantasías, pero quizá diga la verdad.