Quotes from Julien Green

Notre vie est un livre qui s'écrit tout seul. Nous sommes des personnages de roman qui ne comprennent pas toujours bien ce que veut l'auteur.

The greatest explorer on this earth never takes voyages as long as those of the man who descends to the depth of his heart.

In growing older, we become our parents.

Sometimes we do things, without thinking, that make no sense to us until much later, and yet appear to have been prompted by the most alert part of our being.

A novelist is like a scout commissioned to go and see what is happening in the depth of the soul. He comes back and reports what he has observed. He never lives on the surface but only inhabits the darkest regions

Copying is out of the question; only fools and impostors copy. No, the thing is to produce something as good, if possible, out of your own resources. And so begins the strange torture of the blank sheet of paper, where you must open a window that is not the one I spotted just now but one equally insistent in its truthfulness.

What we give the world, we have borrowed from no one; it is ours. It may be taken from us, stolen from us, but imitated? - never.

On ne sait jamais quand la vie va vous trahir ; inutile de compter sur le lendemain, ni même sur l'heure qui va suivre ; il n'y a de certain que la mort.

Bom ou mau, aquilo que sai da Paris é Paris, seja uma carta, um pedaço de pão, um par de sapatos ou um poema.

A cidade, efectivamente, sorri apenas àqueles que se aproximam dela e que deambulam pelas suas ruas; a esses, ela fala numa linguagem tranquilizadora e familiar, mas a alma de Paris só se revela de longe e do alto, e é no silêncio do céu que se escuta o imenso grito patético de orgulho e de fé que ela eleva na direcção das nuvens.

Things we could not tell each other with the width of the Atlantic between us we communicated from heart to heart in those imaginary conversations.

quando me passeio por Passy parece-me que deambulo por dentro de mim mesmo e que tropeço incessantemente na minha infância.

I have always thought that by observing things with a great deal of attention you eventually wrest some of their secrets from them, making them utter what they would most like to keep to themselves.

I am the road running through Paris," says the Seine. 'I have carried off many images since you were a child and reflected many clouds. I am changeable, but as people are: I have my moments of happiness in the June dawn and my sinister times some December evenings. Above all I am inquisitive - you call it being in flood. We have something in common, you everlasting passers-by and I, the fleeing water, which is that we never go back: your time is my space.

A alma de uma grande cidade não se deixa apreender facilmente; é preciso, para se comunicar com ela, termo-nos aborrecido, termos de algum modo sofrido nos lugares que a circunscrevem.

La beauté est un prodige qu'un rien peut anéantir et qui ne devrait s'admirer que de loin, elle s'efface d'une manière aussi difficilement explicable que sa présence même et l'homme n'y porte jamais qu'une main sacrilège.

Oare cunosc si altii spaima de-a merge pe-o strada gandindu-te cu deznadejde la toate strazile pe care nu te afli, strazile unde cei care ar vrea sa te cunoasca te asteapta si pleaca, nevazand pe nimeni venind?

and at that point the church quietly articulated these words, which tell us something of the secret of old buildings: 'The worse I am threatened, the lovelier I become.

Il n'y a pas de hasard, il n'y a que des méchancetés du sort et ses perfidies, préparées de longue main, n'ont cette apparence fortuite que parce que les dessous nous en échappent.

Anderswo, morgen, das sind für Sie immer noch magische Worte. Aber sie werden entdecken: anderswo, das ist hier, und morgen haben wir bereits.

The novelist is like a scout commissioned to go and see what is happening in the depth of the soul. He comes back and reports what he has observed.

Thought flies and words go on foot.

A child's fear is a world whose dark corners are quite unknown to grownup people; it has its sky and its abysses, a sky without stars, abysses into which no light can ever penetrate.

The greatest explorer on this earth never takes voyages as long as those of the man who descends to the depth of his heart.