Quotes from Carlos Ruiz Zafon

Our world will not die as the result of the bomb, as the papers say, it will die of laughter, of banality, or making a joke of everything, and a lousy joke at that.

Over time, loneliness gets inside you and doesn't go away.

Perhaps for that very reason, I adored her all the more, because of the eternal human stupidity of pursuing those who hurt us the most.

In small towns, news travels at the speed of boredom.

I couldn't help thinking that if I, by pure chance, had found a whole universe in a single unknown book, buried in that endless necropolis, tens of thousands more would remain unexplored, forgotten forever. I felt myself surrounded by millions of abandoned pages, by worlds and souls without an owner sinking in an ocean of darkness, while the world that throbbed outside the library seemed to be losing its memory, day after day, unknowingly, feeling all the wiser the more it forgot.

Never trust he who trusts everyone.

One loves truly only once in a lifetime, Julian, even if one isn't aware of it.

In those days I learned that nothing is more frightening than a hero who lives to tell his story, to tell what all those who fell at his side will never be able to tell.

Few things are more deceptive than memories.

It's up to you how you waste your time and money. I'm staying here to read: life's too short.

Keep your dreams, you never know when you might need them.

Wars have no memory, and nobody has the courage to understand them until there are no voices left to tell what happened

Some like to believe it's the book that chooses the person.

The only way you can truly get to know an author is through the trail of ink he leaves behind him. The person you think you see is only an empty character: truth is always hidden in fiction.

A veces dudo de mi memoria y me pregunto si únicamente seré capaz de recordar lo que nunca sucedió

When everyone is determined to present someone as a monster, there are two possibilities: either he's a saint or they themselves are not telling the whole story.

We all give up great expectations along the way.

Al fin y al cabo, ¿qué clase de ciencia es ésa, capaz de poner un hombre en la luna pero incapaz de poner un pedazo de pan en la mesa de cada ser humano?

Conserva tus sueños, nunca sabes cuando te harán falta.

Never trust girls who let themselves be touched right away. But even less those who need a priest for approval.

Nothing important is learned; it is simply remembered.

Remember me, even if it's only in a corner and secretly. Don't let me go.

Literature, at least good literature, is science tempered with the blood of art. Like architecture or music.

It's curious how easy it is to tell a piece of paper what you don't dare say to someone's face.