Quotes from Isabel Allende

cada cual es libre de narrar su vida como mejor le plazca.

En gran parte del mundo vivimos en una cultura enfocada hacia la juventud, la belleza y el éxito. Para cualquier mujer resulta muy difícil navegar en esas aguas; para la mayoría es un naufragio seguro.

I never accepted the limited feminine role imposed upon me by my family, society, culture, and religion. At fifteen I walked away from the church forever, not for lack of faith - that cam later - but because of the inherent machismo of all religious organizations. I cannot belong to an institution that considers me a second-class member whose authorities, always male, enjoy complete impunity and enforce their rules with dogma.

Hi. I'm on the run from the FBI, Interpol, and a Las Vegas criminal gang," I announced bluntly, to avoid any misunderstandings. "Congratulations," he said.

Walking and walking across the world he will gradually find consolation, and one day, when he is too fatigued to take another step, he will realize that he cannot escape sorrow, he will have to tame it, so it doesn't harass him.

There's a certain freshness and innocence in people who have always lived in one place and can count on witnesses to their passage through the world. In contrast, those of us who have moved on many times develop tough skin out of necessity. Since we lack roots or corroboration of who we are, we must put our trust in memory to give continuity to our lives...but memory is always cloudy, we can't trust it.

At the age of twenty-two, suspecting their time was limited, Ichimei and she had gorged on love to enjoy it to the full, but the more they tried to exhaust it, the wilder their desire became, and whoever says that every flame must sooner or later be extinguished is wrong, because there are passions that blaze on until destiny destroys them with a swipe of its paw, and even then hot embers remain that need only a breath of oxygen to be rekindled.

El sabio nada desea, no juzga, no hace planes, mantiene su mente abierta y su corazón en paz»

in the end they grew tired of making all these efforts to stay young and active, and gave in to the temptation of simply resting. I

At the time I had never lived with a woman, so I could hardly miss something I had not grown accustomed to

What's the worst thing about growing old?" she would ask them. They never thought about their age, was a common reply; they had once been adolescents, then they were thirty, fifty, sixty, and never gave it a thought, so why should they do so now?

I was a voracious reader and what I had learned in books confirmed that the world changes constantly and humanity evolves, but the changes are only obtained after much struggle.

En nuestras largas vidas de gozadores [...] hemos comprobado que el mejor estimulante del erotismo, tan efectivo como las más sabias caricias, es una historia contada entre dos sábanas recién planchadas para hacer el amor.

Patria es donde están nuestros muertos», solía decir Carme.

El problema con nosotros es que ella me da por sentado, mientras que yo vivo pensando en que ella se puede ir con otro», pensó.

I must not linger on details, daughter, because if we dally, this account may be left unfinished, and no one wants to read hundreds of quartos only to find that the story has no clear ending.

trastocó la realidad y ya nada volvió a ser como antes.

He missed his venerable master, who had marked him forever with a thirst for knowledge as persistent as the drunk's thirst for alcohol or the ambitious man's thirst for power. He no longer had his mentor's library or his inexhaustible fount of experience.

triunfan. El naipe determina quiénes somos: edad, género, raza, familia, nacionalidad, etcétera, y no lo podemos cambiar, sólo podemos usarlo lo mejor posible. En ese juego hay obstáculos y oportunidades, estrategias y trampas.

but even the most valiant and honorable men sometimes fail their women.

Full belly, happy heart," was the favorite saying of Padre Mendoza, who had been obsessed with good nutrition ever since he'd heard of sailors suffering from scurvy when a lemon could have prevented their agony.

Someone like him who thought more about himself than he did his community, had no place in the tribe. Individualism was thought to be a form of madness, like being possessed by a demon.

Es un momento profético, es toda nuestra existencia, todo lo vivido y lo por vivir, todas las épocas simultáneas, sin principio ni fin.

Ezio Longo, inmigrante de primera generación en el país, arquitecto sin título y constructor de oficio, quien se había propuesto fundar un imperio sobre cemento y acero y a los treinta y cinco años ya lo tenía casi consolidado