Quotes from Erich Maria Remarque

Bertinck has a chest wound. After a while a fragment smashes away his chin, and the same fragment has sufficient force to tear open Leer's hip. Leer groans as he supports himself on his arm, he bleeds quickly, no one can help him. Like an emptying tube, after a couple of minutes he collapses. What use is it to him now that he was such a good mathematician at school.

State and home country, there's a difference

Ja mis teil südamel ka poleks – ärge pidage seda liiga tähtsaks. Vähe on asju, mis kauaks tähtsaks jäävad.

Kes suudab elada, ilma et unustaks? Aga kes suudab küllalt unustada? Mälestuste Å¡lakk, mis südant rebestab. Alles siis, kui sul enam midagi ei ole, mille nimel elada, oled vaba.

Maailmas jätkub kõige jaoks kohta. Ainult mitte inimese jaoks.

Üksindus – elu igavene refrään. See ei olnud ei pahem ega parem kui mõnigi muu asi. Sellest räägiti liiga palju. Inimene on alati – ja mitte iial – üksi.

He reakons that all declarations of war ought to be made into a kind of festival, with entrance tickets and music, like they have at bullfights. Then the ministers and generals of the two countries would have to come into the ring, wearing boxer shorts, and armed with rubber trunchons, and have a go at each other. Whoever is left on his feet, his country is declared the winner. That would be simpler and fairer than things are out here, where the wrong people are fighting each other.

Kes midagi ei oota, ei saa ka pettuda. See on hea lähtepunkt. Kõik, mis siis järgneb, lisab juba natukene juurde.

Armastus teeb naise teravmeelseks, mehe aga võtab juhmiks.

Why—the question on which all logic, all philosophy, all science has shattered up to now

We live in rooms too much, I say. We think too much in rooms. We make love too much in rooms. We despair too much in rooms. Can you despair in the open?

Inimene elatub 75 protsenti omaenda fantaasiast ja ainult 25 protsenti faktidest – see on tema tugevus ja tema nõrkus.

We have lost all feeling for one another. We can hardly control ourselves when our glance lights on the form of some other man. We are insensible, dead men, who through some trick, some dreadful magic, are still able to run and to kill.

Eugénie, all refugees are not Jews. Not even all Jews are Jews. And many of whom you wouldn't believe it are Jews. I even knew a Jewish Negro once. He was a terribly lonely man. The only thing he loved was Chinese food. That's how life is.

We thought to build us houses, we desired gardens with terraces, for we wanted to look out upon the sea and to feel the wind, but we did not think that a house needs foundations. We are like those abandoned fields full of shell holes in France, no less peaceful than the other ploughed lands about them, but in them are lying still the buried explosives, and until these shall have been dug out and cleared away, to plough will be a danger both to plougher and ploughed.

A man has to have something he can put faith in.

In himself man is essentially a beast, only he butters it over like a slice of bread with a little decorum.

Für niemand ist die Erde so viel wie für den Soldaten. Wenn er sich an sie presst, lange, heftig, wenn er sich tief mit dem Gesicht und mit den Gliedern in sie hineinwühlt in der Todesangst des Feuers, dann ist sie sein einziger Freund, sein Bruder, seine Mutter, er stöhnt seine Furcht und seine Schreie in ihr Schweigen und ihre Geborgenheit, sie nimmt sie auf und entlässt ihn wieder zu neuen zehn Sekunden Lauf und Leben, fasst ihn wieder und manchmal für immer.

Then we change our possy and lie down again to play cards. We know how to do that: to play cards, to swear, and to fight. Not much for twenty years;--and yet too much for twenty years.

I see their dark forms, their beards move in the wind. I know nothing of them except that they are prisoners; and that is exactly what troubles me. Their life is obscure and guiltless;--if I could know more of them, what their names are, how they live, what they are waiting for, what are their burdens, then my emotion would have an object and might become sympathy. But as it is I perceive behind them only the suffering of the creature, the awful melancholy of life and the pitilessness of men.

The storm lashes us, out of the confusion of grey and yellow the hail of splinters whips forth the childlike cries of the wounded, and in the night shattered life groans painfully into silence. Our hands are earth, our bodies clay and our eyes pools of rain. We do not know whether we are still alive.

Galimyb? nusižudyti yra likimo dovana, kuri? mes retai tesuvokiame. Ji suteikia laisvo apsisprendimo iliuzij?. Ko gero, mes žudom?s kur kas dažniau, negu manome. Tik nejau?iame to.

ÄŒlovÄ›k nedÄ›lá vždycky, co je správné, synu, Ã…â"¢ekl. Dokonce ani když to ví. V tom nÄ›kdy bývá kouzlo života. ChápeÅ¡?

Odejít není vždy tak snadné, zvláÅ¡Å¥ když ?lovÄ›k s sebou musí vzít i své vlastní já.