Quotes from Antonio Munoz Molina

Era asombrosa la amplitud de lo que uno mismo era capaz de no ver tan solo empeñándose en una ceguera más rigurosa todavía porque era voluntaria.

He'd been one of those daytime men for whom night falls earlier and earlier in their lives.

she decided to break things off (...) with a determination that left no room for ambiguity or remorse, and perhaps had also made her immune to pain.

What had excited most about her from the start was what made him most afraid and what had eventually taken her away from him: the strength of her will.

The appearance of normality was in and of itself a poor antidote to disaster.

Every lover attempts to keep a genealogy of his love, afraid treasured memories will inevitably fade away.

because her sharp intelligence allowed her to understand the extent of what she hadn't learned.

El alma no se ve en la cara ni en los ojos, porque cada cual esta recluido muy en el fondo de si mismo cuando se encuentra frente a desconocidos

He wasn't asking for a lasting future without distress, only a moment to look at her, hear her voice.

He continued to wait as if the force of his obstinacy would influence Judith's actions and will.

Ignacio Abel feels a weariness he doesn't remember having experienced before, all the more evident in the presence of someone younger (but he didn't feel the age difference when he was with Judith; how strange to have lived so long in a state of total unawareness, to have thought himself immune to the years, to weakness, to death)

Only Judith's presence expanded his capacity for seeing, opened his eyes to things he wouldn't have noticed without her.

Observed by others, he was afraid they might discover his inner lack of substance, detect his discomfort behind his smile or the fear that had gradually become his natural state.

You can not fully read a book without being alone. But through this very solitude you become intimately involved with people whom you might never have met otherwise, either because they have been dead for centuries or because they spoke languages you cannot understand. And, nonetheless, they have become your closest friends, your wisest advisors, the wizards that hypnotize you, the lovers you have always dreamed of.

El pasado está lleno de futuros perdidos.

Eres cada una de las personas diversas que has sido y también las que imaginabas que serías, y cada una de las que nunca fuiste, y las que deseabas fervorosamente ser y ahora agradeces no haber sido.

En ningún otro campo profesional se puede llegar más lejos careciendo de cualquier cualificación, conocimiento o habilidad verificable. Se puede dirigir un hospital y hasta ser ministro de sanidad sin tener la menor noción de medicina, y ocupar un puesto de alto rango en la política internacional sin hablar ningún idioma extranjero.

En casa uno facilmente puede sentirse encerrado, agobiado por la falta de horizonte, por la excesiva familiaridad de las cosas. En el cafe se es a la vez sedentario y transeunte, y si uno tiene la suerte de ocupar una mesa junto al ventanal, la situacion es admirable, perfecta: uno es la estampa involuntaria del desconocido que mira la calle tras los cristales del cafe, y esa figura, ese anonimato, le concede una vision alejada y un poco novelesca de si mismo.

Nunca soy más yo mismo que cuando guardo silencio y escucho, cuando dejo a un lado mi fatigosa identidad y mi propia memoria para concentrarme del todo en el acto de escuchar, de ser plenamente habitado por las experiencias y los recuerdos de otros.

She wants to shake him, to feel the danger again and be capable of rejecting it, or to spare herself the pity she feels for him, the self pity she sees in him, the humiliation of having lost her and not being desired by her.

He's always been about to leave. He doesn't know for how many years he's been a guest in his own life.

I've thought a great deal about the things I'd say to you, if I saw you again, but now I don't like having said any of it. We talk and words betray us. You think of them and when you say them out loud they mean something else.

La cara no sólo es el espejo del alma, pensaba: también se va volviendo el espejo de las caras de los muertos.

Cuando lo vi volver, alto y oscilante, las manos hundidas en los bolsillos de su gran abrigo abierto y con las solapas levantadas, entendí que había en él esa intensa sugestión de carácter que tienen siempre los portadores de una historia, como los portadores de un revólver. Pero no estoy haciendo una vana comparación literaria: él tenía una historia y guardaba un revólver.