Quotes from Gustave Flaubert

It is a delicious thing to write, to be no longer yourself but to move in an entire universe of your own creating. Today, for instance, as man and woman, both lover and mistress, I rode in a forest on an autumn afternoon under the yellow leaves, and I was also the horse, the leaves, the wind, the words my people uttered, even the red sun that made them almost close their love-drowned eyes.

la pupilla spenta che intravide tra le palpebre malchiuse lo bollò come d'un marchio di fuoco.

Accustomed to the tranquil side of nature, she sought the dramatic in its stead. She loved the sea only for its storms, and the green grass only when it grew in patches among ruins.

Šta meni ostaje da radim na svetu? Drugi se upinju iz petnih žila da bi došli do bogatstva, slave, vlasti! A ja, ja nemam nikakvog položaja, Vi ste jedino moje zanimanje, svo moje bogatstvo, cilj, centar mog života, mojih misli... Ne mogu više da živim bez Vas, kao što ne mogu bez nebeskog vazduha!

Donc, il fut résolu que l'on empêcherait Emma de lire des romans. L'entreprise ne semblait point facile. La bonne dame s'en chargea : elle devait quand elle passerait par Rouen, aller en personne chez le loueur de livres et lui représenter qu'Emma cessait ses abonnements. N'aurait-on pas le droit d'avertir la police, si le libraire persistait quand même dans son métier d'empoisonneur?

Avec ma main brûlée j'ai le droit maintenant d'écrire des phrases sur la nature du feu.

There is no truth, only perception.

Je suis mystique au fond, et je ne crois à rien

received the cross of the Legion of Honour.

Accustomed to the peaceful, she turned in reaction to the picturesque. She loved the sea only for its storms, green foliage only when it was scattered amid ruins.

L'amour est comme l'opéra. On s'y ennuie mais on y retourne.

La parole est un laminoir qui allonge toujours les sentiments

Then, the anxiety occasioned by her change of state, or perhaps a certain agitation caused by the presence of this man had sufficed to make her believe herself possessed at last of that wonderful passion which hitherto had hovered above her like a great bird of rosy plumage in the splendor of a poetic heaven... But she could hardly persuade herself that the quietness of her present life was the happiness of her dreams.

No se piensa en nada –continuaba él–, las horas pasan. Uno recorre sin moverse países que cree estar viendo, y el pensamiento, siguiendo a la ficción, se recrea en los detalles o sigue el hilo de las aventuras. Se identifica con los personajes y parece que es uno mismo quien palpita bajo sus ropas.

Au contraire  ! Le public n'est pas si bête que ça. Il n'y a de bête, en fait d'art, que 1 le gouvernement, 2 les directeurs de théâtre, 3 les éditeurs, 4 les rédacteurs en chef des journaux, 5 les critiques autorisés  ; enfin tout ce qui détient le Pouvoir, parce que le Pouvoir est essentiellement stupide. Depuis que la terre tourne, le Bien et le Beau ont été en dehors de lui.

You must not think that feeling is everything. Art is nothing without form.

En resumen, la primera injusticia ha sido practicada por la Literatura, que no se preocupa por la Estética, la cual no es más que una justicia superior.

De todas las borrascas que caen sobre el amor, ninguna lo enfría y lo desarraiga tanto como las peticiones de dinero

Poiché la parte vissuta della sua esistenza non era stata nulla di buono, la parte restante sarebbe stata certamente migliore.

Emma tried to find out what one meant exactly in life by the words felicity, passion, rapture, that had seemed to her so beautiful in books.

Whereas a man, surely, should know about everything; excel in a multitude of activities, introduce you to passion in all its force, to life in all its grace, initiate you into all mysteries! But this one had nothing to teach; knew nothing, wanted nothing.

that incongruity of common and elegant in which the habitually vulgar think they see the revelation of an eccentric existence, of the perturbations of sentiment, the tyrannies of art, and always a certain contempt for social conventions, that seduces or exasperates them.

Love, she believed, must come suddenly, with great thunderclaps and bolts of lightning, —a hurricane from heaven that drops down on your life, overturns it, tears away your will like a leaf, and carries your whole heart off with it into the abyss.

In her enthusiasms she had always looked for something tangible: she had loved the church for its flowers, music for its romantic words, literature for its power to stir the passions...