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Fyodor Dostoevsky

Fyodor Dostoevsky Quotes

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Famous Fyodor Dostoevsky Quotes

“It seemed clear to me that life and the world somehow depended upon me now. I may almost say that the world now seemed created for me alone: if I shot myself the world would cease to be at least for me. I say nothing of its being likely that nothing will exist for anyone when I am gone, and that as soon as my consciousness is extinguished the whole world will vanish too and become void like a phantom , as a mere appurtenance of my consciousness, for possibly all this world and all these people are only me myself.”

PeopleIfsWorldMayWholeConsciousnessGoneClearThis WorldShotsMereCeaseWhole WorldVoidMe AlonePhantoms
Author:Fyodor Dostoevsky
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“One's own free unfettered choice, one's own caprice-however wild it may be, one's own fancy worked up at times to frenzy-is that very "most advantageous advantage" which we have overlooked, which comes under no classification and against which all systems and theories are continually being shattered to atoms... [an]will attain his object-that is, convince himself he is a man and not a piano-key!”

MenMayChoicesObjectsTheoryKeysAdvantagePianoFancyConvinceAtomsShatteredOverlookedFrenzyClassificationCapricePiano KeysNotes From The Underground
Author:Fyodor Dostoevsky
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“You are told a lot about your education, but some beautiful, sacred memory, preserved since childhood, is perhaps the best education of all. If a man carries many such memories into life with him, he is saved for the rest of his days. And even if only one good memory is left in our hearts, it may also be the instrument of our salvation one day.”

IfsMenLifeHeartMayBeautifulLeftMemoriesChildhoodOne DayInstrumentsSacredSalvationSavedCarrieGood MemoriesBest Education
Author:Fyodor Dostoevsky
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“Where is it I've read that someone condemned to death says or thinks, an hour before his death, that if he had to live on some high rock, on such a narrow ledge that he'd only room to stand, and the ocean, everlasting darkness, everlasting solitude, everlasting tempest around him, if he had to remain standing on a square yard of space all his life, a thousand years, eternity, it were better to live so than to die at once. Only to live, to live and live! Life, whatever it may be!”

IfsThinkingYearsMayDiesHoursSpaceRoomsDarknessRocksThousandSolitudeOceanStandingEternityPunishmentLive LifeSquaresThousand YearsYardsEverlastingTempestCrime And PunishmentLedgesRaskolnikov
Book:The 10 Greatest Books of All Time
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“The man who lies to himself can be more easily offended than anyone else. You know it is sometimes very pleasant to take offense, isn't it? A man may know that nobody has insulted him, but that he has invented the insult for himself, has lied and exaggerated to make it picturesque, has caught at a word and made a mountain out of a molehill--he knows that himself, yet he will be the first to take offense, and will revel in his resentment till he feels great pleasure in it.”

KnowsMenFeelsFirstsMayMadeSometimesLyingPleasureMountainCaughtPleasantInsultResentmentOffenseOffendedLiedExaggeratedInsultedPicturesqueEasily OffendedInsulted Him
Book:The Brothers Karamazov
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“‎Honoured sir, poverty is not a vice, that's a true saying. Yet I know too that drunkeness is not a virtue, and that's even truer. But beggary, honoured sir, beggary is a vice. In poverty you may still retain your innate nobility of soul, but in beggary--never--no one. For beggary a man is not chased out of human society with a stick, he is swept out with a broom, so as to make it as humiliating as possible; and quite right, too, forasmuch as in beggary as I am ready to be the first to humiliate myself.”

KnowsMenFirstsHumansMayStillsSoulPovertyVirtueReadySticksVicesNobilityInnateHuman SocietyHumiliatingHumiliateBroomsBeggary
Author:Fyodor Dostoevsky
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“Even there, in the mines, underground, I may find a human heart in another convict and murderer by my side, and I may make friends with him, for even there one may live and love and suffer. One may thaw and revive a frozen heart in that convict, one may wait upon him for years, and at last bring up from the dark depths a lofty soul, a feeling, suffering creature; one may bring forth an angel, create a hero! There are so many of them, hundreds of them, and we are all to blame for them. [...] If they drive God from the earth, we shall shelter Him underground.”

IfsYearsHumansHeartMaySoulFeelingsEarthLastsSufferingWaitingSidesDarkMinesHeroCreaturesAngelAnd LoveBlameDepthShelterHuman HeartFrozenMurdererLoftyReviveConvictsBrothers KaramazovLive And Love
Author:Fyodor Dostoevsky
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“You pass by a little child, you pass by, spiteful, with ugly words, with wrathful heart; you may not have noticed the child, but he has seen you, and your image, unseemly and ignoble, may remain in his defenseless heart. You don't know it, but you may have sown an evil seed in him and it may grow, and all because you were not careful before the child, because you did not foster in yourself a careful, actively benevolent love.”

KnowsLoveHeartMayChildrenLittlesAgeEvilGrowsCarefulUglySeedsBenevolentDefenselessIgnobleSpiteful
Author:Fyodor Dostoevsky
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“After all, I quite naturally want to live in order to fulfill my whole capacity for living, and not in order to fulfill my reasoning capacity alone, which is no more than some one-twentieth of my capacity for living. What does reason know? It knows only what it has managed to learn (and it may never learn anything else; that isn't very reassuring, but why not admit it?), while human nature acts as a complete entity, with all that is in it, consciously or unconsciously; and though it may be wrong, it's nevertheless alive.”

KnowsWantLifeHumansMayDoeReasonWholeOrderAliveHuman NatureCapacityLive LifeReasoningWhy NotEntityNeverthelessReassuring
Author:Fyodor Dostoevsky
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“I want peace; yes, I'd sell the whole world for a farthing, straight off, so long as I was left in peace. Is the world to go to pot, or am I to go without my tea? I say that the world may go to pot for me so long as I always get my tea. Did you know that, or not? Well, anyway, I know that I am a blackguard, a scoundrel, an egoist, a sluggard.”

KnowsWorldWantWellsMayLongWholeLeftPeaceSellsWhole WorldTeaPotScoundrelsDid You Know
Book:White Nights and Other Stories
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